🌐 Reflections from the Ark: The Needle of the Bubble 🌐
Yes. OpenAI has closed its largest private funding round in history.
They raised 110 billion dollars with a pre-funding valuation of 730 billion (the post-funding valuation will be approximately 840 billion).
Part of the funds, of course, will not come in cash but in the form of services, as is customary in a bubble.
SoftBank and NVIDIA invested 30 billion each while Amazon contributed 50 billion, in addition to a strategic alliance.
With Amazon, the situation is as follows: Only 15 billion will be available immediately, the remaining 35 billion will be unlocked only under certain conditions (for example, when OpenAI starts using Trainium chips).
Nvidia is also interesting. Do you remember the ambiguity regarding the 100 billion dollar agreement with OpenAI in September?
The current investment apparently represents a replacement for that agreement, ultimately investing three times less than expected, so their investment does not necessarily mean that everything is running smoothly between them and OpenAI.
SoftBank is the biggest advocate for OpenAI in this field. To raise the necessary funds, they even sold 5.8 billion in Nvidia shares.