Japanese investment giant Softbank is planning to invest between $15 billion and $25 billion in OpenAI. If the deal goes through, Softbank will become OpenAI’s largest investor, replacing Microsoft.
It should be noted that this investment will be separate from the money that OpenAI and Softbank have already committed to the Stargate project. The Stargate project was first announced by former President Donald Trump along with Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son, OpenAI's Sam Altman, and Oracle's Larry Ellison. Under the project, OpenAI, SoftBank, Oracle, and investment firm MGX will invest $500 billion over the next four years to build new AI infrastructure in the United States, including large-scale, state-of-the-art data centers.
Chinese AI DeepSeek is making a splash by deploying its R1 reasoning model at a fraction of the cost of OpenAI. This is shaking up the US market and raising concerns about whether the US can maintain its lead in the AI race with China. Recently, Microsoft and OpenAI began investigating whether DeepSeek “secretly” trained its models using “unauthorized” proprietary data from these companies.

This is not the first time Softbank has shown interest in investing in OpenAI. The Japanese investment firm has invested $1.5 billion in the AI company. Softbank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son has long been interested in investing in technology and AI. The Japanese investor has regained some of its financial strength after the successful IPO of ARM Holdings, one of the world's leading chipmakers, despite Softbank still owning a majority stake in it.
OpenAI was last valued at $157 billion in 2024. The company has raised $6.6 billion from various sources, in addition to an investment from Microsoft that has increased its valuation to $13 billion. CEO Sam Altman is trying to reduce OpenAI’s reliance on Microsoft for computing resources by partnering with Oracle. The Stargate project will help OpenAI scale its infrastructure without relying so heavily on Microsoft.