July 11, 2026: Venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya believes AI leaders OpenAI and Anthropic should consider going public before enterprises begin reassessing the economics of large-scale AI adoption. His comments come amid growing debate over whether rapidly rising AI infrastructure and token costs are translating into proportional business value.
Speaking about enterprise AI spending, Palihapitiya said his company's token expenditure is doubling roughly every 45 days, while, in his assessment, productivity gains remain limited at around 5%. Based on this experience, he said the company is reviewing its AI strategy to determine whether current spending levels are justified.
Chamath says OpenAI & Anthropic should IPO before every company realizes they're spending way more on tokens than they need to
"[OpenAI and Anthropic] are great businesses. The question is what is the market clearing price? That's more of a function of how much appetite the… pic.twitter.com/VqeuCWMqjW
According to Palihapitiya, many businesses are likely to face a similar "reckoning" over the next three to four years as chief financial officers and technology leaders begin evaluating whether AI investments are delivering sufficient return on investment.
He further argued that OpenAI and Anthropic remain strong businesses, but, in his opinion, their eventual IPO valuation will depend not only on their technology and revenue growth, but also on investor appetite and public market conditions. He suggested that if enterprise customers begin reducing AI spending or shifting toward lower-cost alternatives, market sentiment toward frontier AI companies could weaken, potentially impacting future IPO valuations.
His remarks add to the ongoing industry discussion around the long-term economics of generative AI, with infrastructure costs, pricing pressure, and sustainable profitability increasingly becoming key considerations for investors evaluating the sector. As of now, OpenAI has not announced any timeline for an initial public offering.
