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Sam Altman signals more big OpenAI deals on the horizon
In 2025 alone, OpenAI has inked deals potentially worth over $1 trillion by some estimates.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has announced that the company is preparing to unveil "much more" in terms of major infrastructure partnerships in the coming months, even after securing multibillion-dollar deals with Oracle, SoftBank, Nvidia, and AMD.
The statement, made during an interview on the a16z Podcast, came almost simultaneously with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's appearance on CNBC. Huang expressed surprise over OpenAI's stock-for-chip deal with competitor AMD, which makes OpenAI a shareholder in AMD.
Nvidia has invested in OpenAI, becoming a shareholder in the AI model maker. Huang stated this marks the first time Nvidia will sell gear—systems and networking beyond just GPUs—directly to OpenAI, intending to prepare it to become a "self-hosted hyperscaler" with its own data centers.
The Funding Challenge: Huang estimated the cost for each gigawatt of AI data center at "$50 to $60 billion" and acknowledged that OpenAI does not currently possess the funds for the full buildout.
In 2025 alone, OpenAI has inked deals potentially worth over $1 trillion by some estimates, including:
The $500 billion Stargate deal with Oracle and SoftBank (10 gigawatts of U.S. facilities).
A partnership with Nvidia for at least 10 gigawatts of AI data centers.
A partnership with AMD for 6 gigawatts.
Both the AMD deal and the Nvidia deal have drawn criticism for being "circular," suggesting that companies like Nvidia are essentially underwriting OpenAI's equipment purchases in exchange for a stake in the AI startup.
Altman justified the aggressive strategy, stating the company's confidence in its future models and products has led it to "make a very aggressive infrastructure bet." Despite current revenue being far below the $1 trillion investment figure (though reportedly hitting $4.5 billion in H1 2025), Altman is "never more confident" in the future economic value these advanced models will generate.
He explained that achieving this scale requires support from the "whole industry," spanning from power supply to model distribution, signaling the need for more partnerships to come.
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