NVIDIA to join Apple, Microsoft funding round for OpenAI that values the AI startup at $100B+

NVIDIA is thinking about joining the new funding round for OpenAI, that would value the AI startup at over $100 billion, reports The Wall Street Journal.

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According to "people familiar with the matter" the new valuation would peg OpenAI at worth over $100 billion, and would see NVIDIA joining US-based tech giants Apple and Microsoft who are also reportedly in talks to participate in the funding round.

Thrive Capital would be leading the funding round, investing around $1 billion, while two sources of the WSJ said that NVIDIA discussed investing about $100 million into OpenAI. The Wall Street Journal reached out to representatives from NVIDIA, Apple, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Thrive, but all of them declined to comment (no surprise).

In a memo sent on Wednesday, OpenAI Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar told staffers that the company was looking for fresh capital, without providing more details, said "people familiar with the matter" reports The Wall Street Journal.

• Read more: ChatGPT has doubled its weekly active users to 200 million users per week
• Read more: Apple delivers ChatGPT to Siri: introduces 'Apple Intelligence' at WWDC 2024
• Read more: Elon Musk sues OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman for breach of contract
• Read more: ChatGPT has a memory feature, will now remember what you've asked
• Read more: Russian man uses Open AI's ChatGPT-4 to find the perfect date on Tinder, AI bot talked to woman

Apple has massively invested into using ChatGPT for its own in-house Apple Intelligence serrvice, which will be rolling out to its new iPhone 16 family that launches next month. Microsoft is already in deep with OpenAI, and we all know NVIDIA's various AI GPUs are powering OpenAI.

The new financing round would bolster one of the world's most valuable venture-backed startups, with the success of ChatGPT seeing every company on the planet want to dive into the AI hype.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a statement shared with Axios: "People are using our tools now as a part of their daily lives, making a real difference in areas like healthcare and education-whether it's helping with routine tasks, solving hard problems, or unlocking creativity".