"Are They Really Salaried Workers?" OpenAI Employees Cash Out $44 Billion Jackpot Each

OpenAI Employees Cash Out Up to $44 Million Each

It has been revealed that OpenAI employees have liquidated up to 30 million dollars (approximately 44.2 billion won) per person by selling their shares prior to the company's initial public offering (IPO).

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on May 10 (local time) that former and current OpenAI employees sold their shares in October last year, cashing out a total of 6.6 billion dollars. Among them, about 75 individuals reached the individual sale limit of 30 million dollars per person. For many employees who joined after the launch of ChatGPT, this was the first opportunity to cash out their holdings.

OpenAI has conducted several tender offers in recent years. However, in the past, the company limited the sale amount to 10 million dollars per employee. As a result, some of the top researchers and engineers who were eligible to sell much larger amounts reportedly expressed dissatisfaction. The company stated that it tripled the sale limit last fall to reflect investor demand.

OpenAI is currently one of the highest-valued startups in the world. Its corporate value, which was about 1 billion dollars in 2019, increased to approximately 29 billion dollars in 2023. After surpassing about 500 billion dollars last year, it has recently soared to 852 billion dollars. Employees who were with the company when it first issued shares seven years ago have seen the value of their holdings increase more than one hundredfold. In contrast, the Nasdaq index rose about threefold over the same period.

The WSJ explained that no previous technology boom in history has provided this level of wealth to employees at the pre-IPO stage. During the dot-com boom, hundreds of companies went public. However, most employees had to wait a long time even after the IPO to cash out their shares. Some were unable to realize the wealth they had anticipated as the bubble burst before they could liquidate their holdings.

Meanwhile, compensation packages in the artificial intelligence (AI) industry, including at OpenAI, are growing increasingly large. Last year, Meta offered compensation packages worth 300 million dollars to some of its top researchers. According to its website, OpenAI is also offering annual salaries exceeding 500,000 dollars for certain technical positions. The company is providing significantly more stock compensation than other tech firms.