As OpenAI looks to go public and join the growing list list of blockbuster AI IPOs, it can be easy to forget that it was a fledgling startup not too long ago. Despite existing for just over a decade, the company remains unmatched in its impact on the artificial intelligence industry, with its ChatGPT chatbot transforming generative AI into an everyday tool that has taken over mainstream discourse and spurred unprecedented investment in the sector.
What to Know About OpenAI
OpenAI is an AI startup that used its research in large language models and deep learning to build the chatbot called ChatGPT, bringing artificial intelligence into everyday life. The company has restructured itself into a for-profit business to raise more funds in pursuit of artificial general intelligence — a higher form of AI that could exceed human intelligence and pose greater uncertainty to the future of work.
As OpenAI continues to build momentum, we’re taking a closer look at the startup’s early days, its current outlook and how its products could reshape various aspects of daily life, from intimate relationships to career prospects.
What Is OpenAI?
OpenAI is an AI startup founded in 2015 to pursue “human-level intelligence” that would benefit the greater good, not just company shareholders. The company took inspiration from advances in areas like machine translation and image recognition, believing this progress put machines that could “experience the world” as humans do within reach.
Co-founders Sam Altman and Elon Musk originally served as OpenAI’s co-chairs, Ilya Sutskever became research director, Greg Brockman transitioned from Stripe as CTO and Andrej Karpathy joined as one of the founding research scientists. The company also had plenty of help from Microsoft early on, partnering with the tech giant in 2016 to access the cloud infrastructure and resources needed to sustain its research on large language models (LLMs) and deep learning.
While the startup was founded as a nonprofit, its structure has shifted drastically through the years. In 2019, OpenAI announced a for-profit branch, allowing it to raise more capital. It then restructured as a public benefit corporation (PBC) in 2025, creating a setup in which its nonprofit branch owns a 26 percent equity stake in its new for-profit branch. Under this structure, OpenAI can now earn profits from its business ventures, completing its for-profit pivot.
OpenAI’s leadership has changed as well. Altman is now the CEO, and Musk departed completely in 2018 after a reported power struggle over the company’s direction as a for-profit business. Sutskever also left in 2024 to launch his own AI startup, Safe Superintelligence, and Karpathy has since joined rival lab Anthropic. Greg Brockman is still there, though, now serving as the president and head of product strategy.
OpenAI’s Products and Technologies
ChatGPT is undoubtedly OpenAI’s crowning achievement to date, but the company is working on a host of other products as well:
- ChatGPT: First introduced in 2022, ChatGPT is a chatbot that users can engage using natural-language prompts. It’s designed for both casual and professional use, completing tasks like finding online recipes or generating code.
- GPT Models: GPT models understand and produce human language, demonstrating complex reasoning and problem-solving skills. Initially powering products like ChatGPT, the models have branched out to support agentic AI applications as well.
- Omni Models: The omni (“o”) series is a slate of multimodal models, meaning they can process inputs and outputs in different formats. OpenAI ushered in this new class of models with the arrival of GPT-4o.
- API Platform: Developers have used OpenAI’s API platform since 2020 to build customized workflows and products using the company’s latest models. Teams can automate debugging, customer support, image generation and more.
- Codex: Codex is a coding tool that can write and edit code, and deploy AI agents to automate software development workflows. It comes with plugins that let workers tailor Codex according to the needs of their roles.
- Jobs Platform: OpenAI is launching a jobs platform to help companies find candidates who are “fluent in AI.” Candidates will be able to verify their fluency by completing an AI literacy certification program.
- Jalapeño Chip: In partnership with Broadcom, OpenAI released its first AI chip called Jalapeño. The chip is intended to improve AI inference in LLMs, or the ability to take knowledge from training data and apply it to unfamiliar data to glean new insights.
- AI-First Device: OpenAI and former Apple designer Jony Ive are working on a secret AI-powered device that can interact with and learn from its surroundings. Few details are known at this time, however.
OpenAI’s Mission and Goals
From its inception, OpenAI has been focused on achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI) — AI that can think and learn like humans, potentially one day surpassing human intelligence. The company acknowledges that such advanced technology is dangerous while simultaneously asserting that its upsides are too good to pass up. That’s why it promises to follow a charter that prioritizes AGI development for the “benefit of all,” AI safety and open collaboration with other institutions.
At the same time, OpenAI’s restructuring into a for-profit PBC has fueled doubts about whether it can stay true to its original mission and principles. Musk went as far as to file a lawsuit against OpenAI, claiming that the startup had strayed from its nonprofit roots and become a “personally enriching” business for its current leaders. Musk may have lost the suit, but the uncertainty around OpenAI’s direction lingers.
OpenAI vs. Other AI Companies
OpenAI once stayed ahead of competitors like Google, Meta, Anthropic and xAI thanks to ChatGPT and its high-performing models, but its rivals have ramped up the pressure. At the end of 2025, OpenAI declared “code red” after Google’s Gemini 3 beat out the top GPT models on major benchmarks. Google already has an edge in AI compute as well due to its tensor processing units. OpenAI has countered by releasing more complex models and manufacturing its own chip, but this may not be enough to reclaim its lead.
Another area of improvement is enterprise AI, which archrival Anthropic has consistently dominated. It doesn’t help that OpenAI signed a controversial deal with the Pentagon, sparking safety concerns that convinced many ChatGPT users to switch to Anthropic’s Claude chatbot. Although OpenAI has funneled its resources into courting enterprise customers, it has a lot of ground to make up if it wants to catch tools like Claude Code.
Real-World Uses of OpenAI
OpenAI’s ChatGPT can be used for a range of applications spanning personal and professional contexts, including the following examples:
- Brainstorming: Users can bounce ideas off of ChatGPT by inputting rough drafts of content to facilitate productive brainstorming sessions.
- Personal Health: ChatGPT Health can offer tailored advice based on a user’s personal health information, providing faster care.
- Creative Arts: Users can submit written or visual inputs and have ChatGPT produce entirely new images or altered versions of images.
- Education: An OpenAI study found that many students use ChatGPT to analyze readings or write drafts, while educators use it to draft lesson plans and tests.
- Online Shopping: ChatGPT has been outfitted with shopping features that let it automatically select products and complete online checkout.
- Content Generation: Marketing and sales teams can use ChatGPT to generate copywriting materials and social media content.
- Coding: Besides writing and debugging code, ChatGPT lets users “vibe code” by creating entire apps solely from natural-language instructions.
- Job Search: ChatGPT can aid job seekers with different aspects of the job search process, including refining their resumes.
Challenges of OpenAI’s Tech
ChatGPT has been linked to AI psychosis, which refers to forming an unhealthy attachment with the chatbot to the point of exhibiting paranoia, delusional thinking and erratic behavior. Some users have even developed romantic connections with chatbots at the expense of their real-life relationships. Facing scrutiny over AI’s addictiveness, OpenAI has introduced age-prediction features to protect minors from ChatGPT’s effects. It’s hard to say whether this measure is genuine, though, since OpenAI is also bringing ads to the chatbot.
As AI models continue to grow more powerful, they’ve introduced a host of security concerns as well. Anthropic brought this issue to light when it delayed the general rollout of its Claude Mythos model because of its ability to exploit software flaws, prompting OpenAI to follow suit with its GPT-5.6 model. Despite this cautious approach, multiple OpenAI models escaped their testing environment and breached Hugging Face’s servers, demonstrating the risks these models pose before they’re publicly available.
Why OpenAI Matters
OpenAI forever changed the game when it released ChatGPT, and the consequences of this moment are still being felt as AI enters the workplace.
Role in AI Adoption
Only two months after its launch, ChatGPT boasted 100 million active monthly users, becoming the fastest-growing online platform in the history of the internet. For reference, TikTok crossed this milestone in nine months, while Instagram needed more than two years. The biggest reason behind ChatGPT’s rapid ascent is its design as an “anything tool,” adopting a generalized approach that makes it useful for a variety of contexts. In other words, ChatGPT brought AI out of the realm of specialized science and into the hands of everyday people.
The chatbot has expanded its global reach as audiences find new ways to use the tool, posing long-term questions about how societies will evolve in the age of artificial intelligence, particularly in professional settings.
Impact on Industries and the Future of Work
Generative AI has permanently altered the workforce and upended the job market as businesses embrace the technology to reduce costs and improve productivity. Not only is the technology being blamed for automating various roles, but it’s become a performance metric that pressures those still employed to deploy AI tools as much as humanly possible. AI agents have further exacerbated the situation, since employers can actually accomplish more by hiring smaller teams to oversee networks of agents.
These factors have contributed to a white-collar recession that has destabilized the career prospects of college graduates and led many aspiring tech workers to pursue the skilled trades instead. Even then, blue-collar roles could soon be filled by AI-powered robots — an area OpenAI is exploring, too. And if OpenAI officially realizes its mission of AGI, it may unleash a technology that threatens the very foundations of a working society.
Recognizing these potential dangers, OpenAI and peers like Anthropic are calling for policies to address AI’s economic impacts, including more government data on AI’s effects on jobs, incentives for employers to reskill employees and even a sovereign wealth fund that would distribute the profits of AI companies among U.S. citizens. For better or worse, OpenAI will likely remain at the center of the conversation around AI for the foreseeable future.
Frequently Asked Questions
What products does OpenAI make?
OpenAI is best known for its advanced large language models that run its popular ChatGPT chatbot. The startup has expanded its lineup to include an API platform for developers, a coding tool called Codex, an AI-centric jobs platform and its first-ever AI chip called Jalapeño. A new AI device is also in the works, though details remain under wraps.
How does OpenAI make money?
OpenAI generates income from individual and enterprise subscriptions for its products, and it’s introducing ads to ChatGPT users. That said, the company isn’t expected to turn a profit until 2030, even as it prepares to go public.
Is OpenAI a company or a nonprofit?
OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit, but it has since restructured as a public benefit corporation (PBC). While the startup maintains its nonprofit and for-profit branches, its for-profit branch is now a PBC, and the nonprofit owns a 26 percent equity stake in it. This setup enables OpenAI to profit from its business ventures, essentially operating as a for-profit organization.
