https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/12/openai_spending_report/ # # Sign in / up The Register | HPE # # # Topics Security Security All SecurityCyber-crimePatchesResearchCSO (X) Off-Prem Off-Prem All Off-PremEdge + IoTChannelPaaS + IaaSSaaS (X) On-Prem On-Prem All On-PremSystemsStorageNetworksHPCPersonal TechCxOPublic Sector (X) Software Software All SoftwareAI + MLApplicationsDatabasesDevOpsOSesVirtualization (X) Offbeat Offbeat All OffbeatDebatesColumnistsScienceGeek's GuideBOFHLegalBootnotesSite NewsAbout Us (X) Special Features Special Features All Special Features Supercomputing Month Cloud Infrastructure Month Datacenter Networking Nexus The State of Storage European Supercomputing AI Infrastructure Month Spotlight on RSAC AI Software Development Week Disaster Recovery Week Nvidia GTC Ransomware in Focus The Future of the Datacenter Cybersecurity Month VMware Explore Vendor Voice Vendor Voice Vendor Voice All Vendor Voice ZTE Nutanix: Scale Kubernetes. Not Chaos. Money Movement Hub The BigQuery Difference AWS Global Partner Security Initiative Amazon Web Services (AWS) New Horizon in Cloud Computing (X) Resources Resources Whitepapers Webinars & Events Newsletters [aiml] AI + ML 2 comment bubble on white OpenAI's viability called into question by reported inference spending with Microsoft 2 comment bubble on white Microsoft internal financials also suggest AI flag bearer is nowhere close to $13 billion in revenues icon Tobias Mann Wed 12 Nov 2025 // 21:04 UTC # OpenAI may be burning far more capital serving its GPT-family of models than previously thought. Leaked documents show the company paying more than $12 billion to Microsoft for compute power since 2024 and suggest much weaker revenue than it needs to pay for all those expenses. According to internal Microsoft financial documents obtained by AI skeptic and tech blogger Ed Zitron, OpenAI blew $8.7 billion serving its models, a process called inference, on Azure alone in the first three quarters of 2025. That's more than double the $3.7 billion the AI flag bearer reportedly spent in 2024. If the info in these leaks are correct, OpenAI's expense line is even worse than it looks at first blush. The report, we'll note, didn't include details on any training-specific spend at the cloud provider. It also does not mention CoreWeave and Google, which OpenAI also pays for compute capacity. [aiml] Using these numbers, OpenAI would be on a trajectory to far exceed the $9 billion in cash burn previously reported by the Wall Street Journal earlier this week. [aiml] [aiml] However, there's reason to believe these documents may not provide a full picture as to OpenAI's financial relationship with its long-time compute partner, Microsoft. According to the Financial Times, which also got a look at the documents, a Microsoft spokesperson said "the numbers aren't quite right," but declined to comment further. Another source familiar with OpenAI suggested to the FT that the figures offered an incomplete accounting of the two company's dealings. [aiml] One possibility is that these documents may not account for the possibility of cloud credits Microsoft granted to OpenAI. Those credits would likely end up lumped with other customers and show up under cost of sales in Microsoft's accounting. In that case, depending on how Microsoft has chosen to engineer its books, the figures in the report may inflate the amount of cash OpenAI is actually spending on inference with Azure each quarter. Then there's the revenue side of the picture. Zitron's report also suggests that OpenAI's sales may be significantly smaller than its previous reports about annual recurring revenues (ARRs) imply. Also on Wednesday, OpenAI rival Anthropic announced a $50 billion investment in US datacenter infrastructure in collaboration with Fluidstack. The collaboration will see the construction of several large datacenters in Texas and New York. The announcement didn't address how the AI startup would pay for said datacenters, what silicon would power them, or the timeline over which they'd be built. The AI startup did suggest that, when complete, the project would create around 800 permanent jobs, each paying on average $144,000. (r) These details are based on a 20 percent revenue share that OpenAI pays Microsoft under the company's initial $1 billion tie-up in 2019. Under that deal, Microsoft also pays OpenAI a 20 percent slice of revenue from the resale of OpenAI models and services under its brand. The documents show Microsoft received $454.7 million from OpenAI during the first half of calendar year 2025. Taking into account the 20 percent revenue share, this suggests that OpenAI's sales during the period were approximately $2.27 billion. As Zitron notes, that's approximately $2 billion short of the $4.3 billion in revenues The Information reported in early October. [aiml] The documents indicate that OpenAI's revenues surged in the quarter ended Sept. 30, with Microsoft's share of sales reaching $865.9 million through that quarter, putting OpenAI's calculated revenues at $4.33 billion. In spite of the jump, these figures are still in conflict with statements OpenAI CEO Sam Altman made earlier this month that the company's annual revenues would exceed $13 billion. However, just like OpenAI's inference spend, it's possible that the figures contained within the report are incomplete. As mentioned earlier, Microsoft also pays OpenAI a 20 percent share of revenues from reselling the AI dev's models. * Superintelligence probably not happening, but AI will still reshape society, expert panel says * Altman sticks a different hand out, wants tax credits instead of gov loans * Meta can't afford its $600B love letter to Trump * OpenAI's Altman and Friar walk back remarks about federal loan guarantees The documents appear to apply only to Azure. But Microsoft may be paying OpenAI separately out of other segments within its software business. Microsoft integrates OpenAI products into several products including its Bing search engine, Office 365 productivity Suite, GitHub copilot code assistant. Unfortunately, Microsoft has yet to break out AI-related revenues in the associated fields. However, Redmond's own financial reporting did indicate that OpenAI had a net loss in the neighborhood of $12 billion during the quarter ended Sept. 30. If nothing else, Wednesday's reports underscore the need for greater financial transparency from OpenAI and its partners. Customers planning for the AI revolution need to understand if the finances don't work, as that would imply either a slower buildout or higher prices than expected. El Reg reached out to Microsoft and OpenAI for their comment. Microsoft declined, and OpenAI did not respond by press time. (r) Get our Tech Resources # Share More about * AI * Datacenter * Large Language Model More like these x More about * AI * Datacenter * Large Language Model * Microsoft * OpenAI Narrower topics * Active Directory * AIOps * Amazon Bedrock * Anthropic * Azure * Bing * BSoD * ChatGPT * Copilot * DeepSeek * Disaster recovery * Excel * Exchange Server * Gemini * Google AI * GPT-3 * GPT-4 * HoloLens * Internet Explorer * LinkedIn * Machine Learning * MCubed * Microsoft 365 * Microsoft Build * Microsoft Edge * Microsoft Fabric * Microsoft Ignite * Microsoft Office * Microsoft Surface * Microsoft Teams * .NET * Neural Networks * NLP * Office 365 * Open Compute Project * OS/2 * Outlook * Patch Tuesday * Pluton * PUE * Retrieval Augmented Generation * SharePoint * Skype * Software defined data center * SQL Server * Star Wars * Tensor Processing Unit * TOPS * Visual Studio * Visual Studio Code * Windows * Windows 10 * Windows 11 * Windows 7 * Windows 8 * Windows Server * Windows Server 2003 * Windows Server 2008 * Windows Server 2012 * Windows Server 2013 * Windows Server 2016 * Windows Subsystem for Linux * Windows XP * Xbox * Xbox 360 Broader topics * Bill Gates * Self-driving Car More about # Share 2 comment bubble on white COMMENTS More about * AI * Datacenter * Large Language Model More like these x More about * AI * Datacenter * Large Language Model * Microsoft * OpenAI Narrower topics * Active Directory * AIOps * Amazon Bedrock * Anthropic * Azure * Bing * BSoD * ChatGPT * Copilot * DeepSeek * Disaster recovery * Excel * Exchange Server * Gemini * Google AI * GPT-3 * GPT-4 * HoloLens * Internet Explorer * LinkedIn * Machine Learning * MCubed * Microsoft 365 * Microsoft Build * Microsoft Edge * Microsoft Fabric * Microsoft Ignite * Microsoft Office * Microsoft Surface * Microsoft Teams * .NET * Neural Networks * NLP * Office 365 * Open Compute Project * OS/2 * Outlook * Patch Tuesday * Pluton * PUE * Retrieval Augmented Generation * SharePoint * Skype * Software defined data center * SQL Server * Star Wars * Tensor Processing Unit * TOPS * Visual Studio * Visual Studio Code * Windows * Windows 10 * Windows 11 * Windows 7 * Windows 8 * Windows Server * Windows Server 2003 * Windows Server 2008 * Windows Server 2012 * Windows Server 2013 * Windows Server 2016 * Windows Subsystem for Linux * Windows XP * Xbox * Xbox 360 Broader topics * Bill Gates * Self-driving Car TIP US OFF Send us news --------------------------------------------------------------------- Other stories you might like You can now put your US passport into Apple Wallet for domestic travel But only a few states plus Puerto Rico will accept it Personal Tech12 Nov 2025 | Google sues 25 China-based scammers behind Lighthouse 'phishing for dummies' kit 600+ phishing websites and 116 of these use a Google logo Cyber-crime12 Nov 2025 | 2 Google apes Apple, swears cloud-based AI will keep your info private We take your privacy, seriously AI + ML12 Nov 2025 | Bring complexity under control with enterprise-grade Kubernetes No, it'll probably never be a doddle - but you don't have to take the hard way when deploying Kubernetes, says Nutanix Sponsored Feature [aiml] First stellar Coronal Mass Ejection detected beyond our Sun Red dwarf hurls plasma at speeds rarely seen from Sun, potentially stripping atmospheres from orbiting planets Science12 Nov 2025 | 12 Attackers turned Citrix, Cisco 0-day exploits into custom-malware hellscape Vendors (still) keep mum Security12 Nov 2025 | 2 Apple knits up $230 sock for your iPhone in time for Christmas Fashion house behind Jobs' turtleneck helps with pricey new accessory line Offbeat12 Nov 2025 | 23 VLC's keeper of the cone nets European free software gong Jean-Baptiste Kempf lauded for keeping the media player free of crapware Software12 Nov 2025 | 12 Broken wizard forces Microsoft to issue out-of-band Windows 10 patch End of support? Not quite OSes12 Nov 2025 | 11 Microsoft ships .NET 10 LTS and Visual Studio 2026, Copilot everywhere Faster and easier to use but adopting the dev stack not without risks Software12 Nov 2025 | 3 Brussels weighs banning China from major EU research scheme Draft Horizon Europe plan cites lack of IP protections and Beijing's civil-military fusion strategy Science12 Nov 2025 | 6 MS Task Manager turns 30: Creator reveals how a 'very Unixy impulse' endured in Windows Dave Plummer's 85 KB troubleshooting tool shipped with his home number on the code Applications12 Nov 2025 | 24 The Register icon Biting the hand that feeds IT About Us* * Contact us * Advertise with us * Who we are Our Websites* * The Next Platform * DevClass * Blocks and Files Your Privacy* * Cookies Policy * Privacy Policy * Ts & Cs * Do not sell my personal information Situation Publishing Copyright. All rights reserved (c) 1998-2025 no-js