Report: OpenAI plans to shift compute needs from Microsoft to SoftBank

OpenAI is forecasting a major shift in the next five years around who it gets most of its computing power from, The Information reported on Friday.

By 2030, OpenAI expects to get three-quarters of its data center capacity from Stargate, a project that’s expected to be heavily financed by SoftBank, one of OpenAI’s newest financial backers. That represents a major shift away from Microsoft, OpenAI’s biggest shareholder, who fulfills most of the startup’s power needs today.

The change won’t happen overnight. OpenAI still plans to increase its spending on Microsoft-owned data centers in the next few years.

During that time, OpenAI’s overall costs are set to grow dramatically. The Information reports that OpenAI projects to burn $20 billion in cash during 2027, far more than the $5 billion it reportedly burned through in 2024. By 2030, OpenAI reportedly forecasts that its costs around running AI models, also known as inference, will outpace what the startup spends on training AI models.