Amazon is in discussions to invest more than $10 billion in OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, in a deal that could value the AI firm at over $500 billion, according to The Information, a tech news site that revealed the negotiations.
The potential investment would help OpenAI fund the massive cost of running and expanding its artificial intelligence systems, which rely on vast data centres and powerful computer chips. OpenAI has already committed to spending $38 billion over seven years on cloud capacity from Amazon Web Services, the world's largest data centre provider.
If completed, the deal could form part of a wider fundraising round involving other investors. OpenAI's long-term spending on computing power is estimated at $1.4 trillion over the next eight years, far exceeding its current revenues, making fresh funding essential. OpenAI, which recently converted its core business into a for-profit company, is also weighing a future stock market listing that could eventually value it at up to $1 trillion.