January 22, 2025 – During the World Economic Forum in Davos, Sarah Friar, the Chief Financial Officer of OpenAI, sat down for an interview with Bloomberg to discuss Elon Musk’s legal efforts to prevent OpenAI’s transition to a for-profit company. She characterized these actions as a form of competition.
“We hope he doesn’t continue to compete through legal means,” Friar stated. Musk, an early founding member of OpenAI, now owns xAI and has accused OpenAI of straying from its original nonprofit mission.

Friar emphasized that developing artificial intelligence requires significant funding, a fact that Musk was well aware of early on, necessitating that OpenAI be more than just a nonprofit organization. She highlighted that OpenAI is exploring new funding sources and revenue models to support its technological advancements. While the company may seek further financing, Friar also weighed the pros and cons of going public. She noted that an Initial Public Offering (IPO) could provide access to new funding channels like structured debt, lowering financing costs. However, it might also pressure the company to overly focus on short-term investor interests when developing cutting-edge AI models.
According to Friar, the development cost of the next-generation, state-of-the-art GPT model could reach billions of dollars. She underscored the importance of attracting “the right investors who understand the technology development process.” She added, “Going public could be a potential option in our journey, but I don’t want it to be the end game.”
Last October, OpenAI raised 6.6billioninafundinground,valuingthecompanyat157 billion and marking one of the largest private investments in the AI sector. Friar revealed that OpenAI is venturing into the realm of “intelligent agents,” developing reasoning models capable of replacing human workers. Early applications of these technologies include solving everyday problems like planning dinners for consumers or providing software development and research assistant services for businesses.
Friar also mentioned that many corporate clients first encountered OpenAI’s products through their personal lives, and the enterprise market represents a significant growth area for the company. She cited Morgan Stanley’s adoption of OpenAI’s technology in wealth management and investment banking as an example. In conclusion, Friar stated that OpenAI’s technology is “truly penetrating every sector of the economy.”