OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has announced that the company is preparing to make what he described as a “very aggressive infrastructure bet” as it enters one of its most ambitious growth phases. He stated, “I have never been more confident in the research roadmap in front of us and also the economic value that will come from using those models.”
Altman made it clear that OpenAI is now focused on building the computational strength required for the next generation of artificial intelligence models. This shift is so large in scale that he indicated the company is open to working closely with partners across the technology sector, even if they may be competitors in the market.
OpenAI is planning an infrastructure buildout that could become one of the largest data centre networks ever created. When asked by the hosts of a podcast about the size of the vision, Altman admitted the undertaking would be massive. He said, “The scale is sort of ridiculously terrifying enough that you have to be open to doing something else.”
He emphasised that this investment is not only about computing power. It is central to the company’s mission. Altman explained that strong research helps them create powerful products, and the infrastructure is what enables that research.
Speaking about why OpenAI is choosing this moment for such a large expansion, Altman said the company is facing rising global demand. “We would still expand because we can see how much demand there is; we cannot serve with today’s model. We would not be going this aggressive if all we had was today’s model.”
He added that the capability gap between what the public sees and what advanced users are testing is significant. According to him, some early users already understand how far the next generation of models can go, noting, “Those people have no idea what is going on.”
Altman said the company has visibility into the next one to two years of progress and believes that more powerful models will create enough economic value to justify this level of investment.
A key part of OpenAI’s approach is collaboration. Altman said, “To make the bet at this scale, we need the whole industry or a big chunk of the industry to support it. This is like everything from electrons to model distribution and all the stuff in between.” This strategy has already led to new partnerships with firms such as AMD, Oracle and Nvidia.
When asked whether this infrastructure growth would continue indefinitely, Altman said there are natural limits. He noted that there is only so much global economic capacity, and AI still does not operate in robotics. Yet he added that the limits remain far away from where the company stands today.
OpenAI’s growing focus on infrastructure signals a major shift in how it operates. It is now evolving beyond a research lab and consumer technology creator into a large-scale infrastructure organisation prepared for the future demands of artificial intelligence.
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