According to a new report from the Financial Times, OpenAI has informed investors that the company is expected to make $50 billion in revenue for the year.
That’s a lot of money, but it’s also a full $20 billion less than earlier projections from just last month, which predicted the company would earn $70 billion in annual revenue.
AI companies like Anthropic and OpenAI are in the midst of an unprecedented infrastructure spending spree, with the AI industry spending trillions on data centers and other resources. And as CNN noted, the Financial Times’ report could “rattle investors” worried that these companies won’t be able to turn a profit after all.
Tech stocks took a hit on the market after the revenue shortfall was reported.
According to the Financial Times, the $70 billion figure didn’t come from OpenAI itself, but rather from investors comparing OpenAI’s revenue with its main competitor, Anthropic. The latter’s revenue projections include revenue from cloud providers, whereas OpenAI does not include this in its revenue numbers.
OpenAI raised $122 billion in March at a valuation of $852 billion. OpenAI has recently been seeking an additional $30 billion in funds at a valuation of around $1.4 trillion.
However, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced last month that he was delaying the company’s IPO and that it would not be coming in 2026. Altman cited concerns regarding AI safety as the reason for the delay.
While Anthropic still plans to go public sometime this year, the OpenAI competitor’s prospectus points to some revenue troubles as well. The company lost $42 billion in 2025.
Disclosure: Ziff Davis, Mashable’s parent company, in April 2025 filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.
Source: https://mashable.com/tech/openai-20-billion-less-revenue
