OpenAI Projects $278 Billion Cash Burn by 2030 as Anthropic Weighs New Model Launch

OpenAI expects to burn through roughly $278 billion in negative free cash flow by the end of the decade, driven by $856 billion in planned compute and infrastructure spending, according to Financial Times reporting published September 18. Revenue is projected to climb from $36 billion this year to $350 billion in 2030, totaling approximately $840 billion over the period, but expenses will far exceed those figures throughout. The cash-burn figure is nonetheless an improvement from the $305 billion projection circulated in May.

The $122 billion cash raise OpenAI completed in March is projected to be exhausted by 2028, and the company is already in discussions about another major funding round. Investors have been approaching OpenAI at a valuation of roughly $1.2 trillion, while OpenAI itself is seeking a higher figure. The company confidentially filed for an IPO in June and had targeted a fall listing, but has since delayed that process.

OpenAI has been cutting prices as it competes with Anthropic and cheaper Chinese open-weight models, and new model launches helped lift annualized revenue by about 20% in July. In response to OpenAI's momentum following the launch of GPT-6 Astra, Anthropic is now considering rolling out a new AI model of its own ahead of an expected IPO, according to three sources cited by Reuters, even as its CEO has publicly called for an industrywide slowdown. Separately, Elon Musk has claimed AI will double U.S. economic growth to 4% next year, a forecast well above the Federal Reserve's 2.4% projection.