OpenAI nears up to $30 billion funding round at $1.25 trillion valuation led by UAE investors

JUST IN: OpenAI nears a new funding round of up to $30 billion at a $1.25 trillion valuation, led by UAE investors, as a bridge to its planned 2027 IPO.

OpenAI is about to be worth one and a quarter trillion dollars.

The company is raising up to 30 billion in fresh cash, and the lead money is coming from the United Arab Emirates alongside Coatue. You can see the details here, the round is being pitched as an opportunistic bridge to an IPO, and OpenAI wants signatures by the end of next week.

There's a twist in the paperwork too. Alongside the cheque, OpenAI is negotiating a deal for more computing power from the UAE. That makes sense when you remember this company told investors it plans to spend roughly 600 billion dollars on compute by 2030.

Sarah Friar, the finance chief, told staff OpenAI will be public in 2027. Sam Altman then said going public right now would be ill advised. Meanwhile rival Anthropic is reportedly chasing up to two trillion in its own offering.

So a company that has never turned a profit is a month of signatures away from a valuation bigger than most countries' economies.

This is Liu Yang, reporting for HIT.