OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently revealed that the company is losing more money than expected on its $200-per-month ChatGPT Pro subscription.
A subscription for €200 and yet…
OpenAI, to which we owe the explosion of artificial intelligence, finds itself facing an unexpected financial dilemma. Its premium offering, ChatGPT Pro, launched at the end of last year, generates traffic well beyond initial forecasts. This service, which offers an improved version of the o1 “reasoning” AI model and lifts restrictions on several tools, such as the Sora video generator, has clearly attracted many users. But contrary to what one might think, this success is not only good news for the company led by Sam Altman.
When ChatGPT Pro launched, the price of $200 per month, or $2,400 per year, raised many questions. For users, the value proposition of o1 pro mode remained unclear, while for OpenAI it was a risky bet on profitability. Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, admitted to having set this price without in-depth study, hoping that the company would benefit from it.
However, the facts are there: users are exploiting ChatGPT Pro to its maximum capabilities, which results in high costs for OpenAI. “I personally chose the price, and I thought we would make money”admitted the CEO in a series of messages on X. But it seems that the company underestimated the popularity of this service, to the point that intensive use by subscribers directly impacts OpenAI’s finances..
An economic model to be revised
OpenAI is no stranger to bold pricing decisions. In a recent interviewSam Altman discussed the trial and error that went into pricing ChatGPT’s initial premium plan, where two options were tested: $20 and $42. Ultimately, the amount of $20 was chosen, a choice that was more intuition than a rigorous strategy..
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons and Jonathan Kemper (Unsplash)
Today, OpenAI faces a major challenge: becoming profitable. Despite fundraising of nearly $20 billion since its creation, the company forecasts significant losses, with forecasts of a deficit of 5 billion dollars on a turnover of 3.7 billion last year. Costs related to staff, AI training infrastructure and daily operations take a heavy toll on company finances. As an example, running ChatGPT used to cost $700,000 per day.
Faced with this situation, OpenAI is considering several avenues to redress the situation. A restructuring of the company is underway to attract new investors, and an increase in subscription prices is being considered. Sam Altman also hinted that the company could adopt usage-based pricing for some services, to better balance its costs and revenue.
