Microsoft to invest $10 bln in ChatGPT-owner OpenAI: Report

Microsoft Corp is in talks to invest $10 billion in ChatGPT-owner OpenAI. The funding from Microsoft will then value the firm at $29 billion, according to a report citing people familiar with the matter.

There has been a rising interest in the artificial intelligence company, whose chatbot has dazzled amateurs and industry experts with its ability to spit out haikus, debug code and answer questions while imitating human speech. The funding could also include other venture firms and documents sent to prospective investors outlining its terms indicated a targeted close by the end of 2022, according to the report.

Microsoft had in 2019 invested $1 billion in OpenAI, founded by Elon Musk and Sam Altman. Microsoft's cloud services arm also provides the computing power needed by the AI firm. The software firm last year unveiled plans to integrate image-generation software from OpenAI into its search engine Bing.

According to Semafor, Microsoft will also get 75% of OpenAI's profits until it recoups its initial investment. Microsoft would have a 49% stake in OpenAI, with other investors taking another 49% and OpenAI's nonprofit parent getting 2%, Semafor said.

OpenAI charges developers licensing its technology about a penny or a little more to generate 20,000 words of text, and about 2 cents to create an image from a written prompt. It spends about a few cents in computing power every time someone uses its chatbots.

A Wall Street Journal report said last week OpenAI was in talks to sell existing shares at a roughly $29 billion valuation in a tender offer that would attract investment of at least $300 million.