Apple is in talks to invest in OpenAI, the Wall Street Journal reports, building upon the companies’ previously announced partnership as the tech giant prepares to launch integration of OpenAI’s popular market-leading ChatGPT features in Apple’s Mac and iOS operating systems. Nvidia, the maker of chips that power OpenAI, is also in talks to invest.
It’s part of a new OpenAI fundraising round valuing the company at more than $100 billion, the Journal reports, citing people familiar with the situation. Thrive Capital is leading this fundraising round, set to raise several billion dollars.
Apple’s tech frienemy Microsoft is also set to participate in this round of fundraising. Microsoft has already investment $13 billion in the company as part of its own partnership with OpenAI and owns 49% of the AI company’s profits.
How much either Apple or Microsoft will invest in this fundraising round remains unknown. The Journal notes that Apple making this investment is unusual for the company, which hasn’t had a history of investing in startups, instead usually focusing on investments in manufacturing partners.
Apple is launching a foray into AI with its new “Apple Intelligence” features, announced earlier this year and currently available in beta. However, those features are expected to significantly expand over the next few months and into next year, with more details likely to come at Apple’s “Glowtime” event on Sept. 9.
“Apple’s talks to invest in OpenAI underscores its dedication to ensure it maintains access to this technology,” the Journal notes.
The iPhone manufacturer has also said that it plans to work with other companies to incorporate their generative AI tools in the Apple ecosystem, with Google’s Gemini named publicly as a potential partner. Apple has also held talks with Anthropic, creator of the Claude AI system, as well as the controversial Perplexity.
While some AI capabilities will be featured on the iPhone itself, as well as through Apple’s own servers, more complex tasks will be sent for processing to ChatGPT. However, Apple has worked to set up stronger privacy protections for its users than are normally standard when people interact with OpenAI’s service directly.
