OpenAI accelerates revenue pace to $40 billion amid personnel turbulence ahead of IPO
OpenAI is demonstrating impressive financial momentum: the company's annual recurring revenue (ARR) has reached $40 billion. This figure has doubled since the end of 2025, sending a powerful signal to the market ahead of a potential initial public offering.
Such aggressive growth strengthens the position of those advocating for a stock market debut, yet the company is simultaneously facing serious instability in its top leadership.
Three Monetization Drivers
Three areas have made a key contribution to accelerating revenue. First, the number of paying ChatGPT subscribers continues to grow. Second, sales of developer tools focused on coding are rapidly increasing. Third, the young advertising business is already generating substantial cash flow.
According to my data, the company's revenue grew by more than 20% in July compared to June. Moreover, July proved to be more productive than the entire second quarter combined. This was also driven by a new pricing strategy: lowering service costs for corporate clients not only failed to reduce revenue but also attracted new customers.
Additional momentum came from AI agents — Codex for programmers and ChatGPT Work for office teams. Both products are successfully pushing clients toward more expensive plans, increasing the average transaction value.
Leadership Turmoil
However, amid these financial successes, key executives are leaving the company. In the coming weeks, Chief Revenue Officer Denise Dresser, who has been with OpenAI for about eight months, will step down. Global sales will be led by Dali Rajic, who previously served as president at cybersecurity company Wiz.
This is not the first loss in management: Chief Operating Officer Brad Lightcap and Fidji Simo have previously departed. Over the past few months, the company has also lost its head of ethics, its head of security, and its chief strategy officer. President Greg Brockman has been forced to take on some management functions to stabilize the situation.
The Race for Leadership
Preparation for the IPO is in full swing: the company has filed for a confidential listing and has bought back $7 billion worth of shares from employees. Meanwhile, competitor Anthropic plans to go public as early as October with a valuation exceeding $2 trillion.
OpenAI's stock price will directly depend on whether revenue growth can offset the negative impact of the departure of top executives. Investors will need to assess how sustainable the company's business model is amid leadership uncertainty.
My view: reaching the $40 billion ARR milestone is undoubtedly a strong fundamental indicator, demonstrating the scale of AI monetization. However, C-suite turnover ahead of the IPO is a worrying signal that could point to internal contradictions in the growth strategy. The market is currently pricing in maximum optimism, and any execution misstep could lead to a significant correction.