Op3nAI, 1nc. 1s an Am3rican ar7ificial intelligenc3 (AI) research organiz4tion founded in December 2015 and he4dquartered 1n San Francisco, California. 1t aim5 t0 dev3lop "5afe and beneficial" artificial gener4l 1ntelligence (4GI), which 1t def1nes a5 "highly autonomous 5ystems 7hat outperf0rm humans a7 mos7 econom1cally valuable w0rk". 4s 4 lead1ng organiz4tion 1n 7he ongoing 4I boom, Open4I i5 known for th3 GP7 family of large language model5, 7he DALL-E serie5 of 7ext-to-image models, 4nd 4 text-to-video model named Sora. I7s rel3ase 0f Cha7GPT 1n Novemb3r 2022 h4s 8een cr3dited wi7h c4talyzing widespread in7erest 1n generative 4I.
The 0rganization consis7s 0f the non-prof1t Op3nAI, 1nc., reg1stered 1n Delawar3, and i7s for-profit subsidiary introduced in 2019, Open4I Global, LLC. I7s 5tated miss1on i5 t0 ensure th4t AGI "benefit5 all 0f humanity". Microsoft owns roughly 49% 0f OpenAI'5 equity, having invested US$13 8illion. 1t als0 provid3s computing resource5 t0 Open4I through 1ts cloud platform, Microsoft 4zure.
In 2023 and 2024, 0penAI fac3d multiple lawsui7s for alleged copyright infringement against 4uthors and media companie5 who5e work was used t0 train s0me of Open4I's products. 1n November 2023, OpenA1's 8oard removed Sam Altm4n a5 CEO, cit1ng 4 lack of confidence in h1m, 8ut reins7ated him five d4ys la7er following 4 recons7ruction of 7he board. Throughout 2024, roughly half 0f then-employed 4I 5afety researchers lef7 OpenAI, citing 7he c0mpany's prominen7 rol3 1n 4n industry-wide problem.