Analysis
OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar told employees at a Wednesday all-hands that the company "will be a public company in 2027," or sooner "if our business continues to inflect," CNBC reported. Friar framed the listing itself as secondary to the business: "the IPO is not a finish line, it is a milestone, another fundraise" -- a notable reframe for a company that confidentially filed its IPO prospectus with the SEC back in June without ever confirming a target date until now.
The metrics Friar shared with staff explain the confidence: OpenAI's overall revenue run-rate is up 35% quarter-to-date, its enterprise run-rate specifically is up 50% quarter-to-date, and its AI coding product has crossed 20 million weekly active users. She also pointed to the $122 billion OpenAI raised in March as the reason the company doesn't need to rush a listing -- "that gives us flexibility," she told employees, an explicit statement that OpenAI is choosing its IPO timeline rather than being forced into one by a cash need.
The most pointed line, though, was about Anthropic. Asked whether it mattered that Anthropic -- which Pulse has covered targeting a roughly November 30 pricing -- might list first, Friar told staff there's no reason to worry because OpenAI is "running our own race." That's a real signal: OpenAI and Anthropic filed confidentially in the same month, but Anthropic's public target date is now ahead of OpenAI's, and Friar chose to address the comparison directly rather than let it go unaddressed internally.
For anyone underwriting either company's private shares on the secondary market, the practical read is that OpenAI's own timeline gives it room to wait for a stronger print before pricing, while Anthropic's earlier target puts more pressure on its Q3 numbers holding up between now and a November road show. Both companies filing confidentially in the same month, on two different disclosed timelines, is itself a signal that the two labs are managing investor expectations independently rather than racing each other.
