OpenAI Forecasts Nearly $280B Cash Burn Through 2030

OpenAI expects to burn roughly $278 billion in cash between 2026 and 2030, according to an internal presentation cited by the Financial Times. The company’s own figures attribute the shortfall to stepped-up spending on compute capacity and infrastructure required to train and run advanced AI models.

OpenAI projects a negative free cash flow of $278 billion from 2026 to 2030.

Infrastructure spending drives the gap

The Financial Times report says OpenAI’s planning documents forecast negative free cash flow of $278 billion across the five-year period, meaning the company’s cumulative expenses and investments would exceed cash inflows by that amount. The firm expects to accelerate capital outlays to secure the compute and data-centre capacity needed for next-generation models.

Despite the projected cash burn, OpenAI expects revenues to expand rapidly. The presentation forecasts a roughly tenfold increase, from $36 billion this year to $350 billion in 2030, and a total expected revenue of about $840 billion by the end of the decade.

The single largest cost line is compute and infrastructure. OpenAI’s materials predict spending in that category could approach $856 billion by the end of 2030.

Those spending plans sit alongside recent fundraising and strategic moves. The Financial Times notes OpenAI raised $122 billion in March at a valuation of $852 billion, and has quietly held talks with investors about a potential pre-IPO valuation near $1.2 trillion. The company confidentially filed initial paperwork to go public in June, but CEO Sam Altman has said the IPO will not take place in 2026 because of concerns about AI safety.

The Financial Times frames the forecasts as an urgent case for fresh capital. The company’s own projections indicate the $122 billion raised in March will be exhausted by 2028.