Financial black hole, technological stagnation, OpenAI faces a critical bankruptcy crisis

The AI race has heated up, and OpenAI is facing its most severe survival challenge since its founding. Recently, the well-known tech channel ColdFusion released an in-depth investigative video, collecting reports and data from major media outlets to reveal the numerous crises behind this AI giant’s glamorous exterior, including massive financial black holes, growth bottlenecks in core technology, market share loss, and controversies surrounding Sam Altman himself. This article summarizes the video’s viewpoints, analyzing from technical, financial, and founder personality perspectives—questioning whether OpenAI is truly leading the future or, as the video predicts, accelerating toward bankruptcy.

Orion Project Fails, Technical Stagnation Prevents Breakthroughs

In recent years, the AI field has generally followed Scaling Laws, which suggest that increasing computational power and data can lead to exponential growth in large language models. However, in 2025, OpenAI launched the Orion project, which ultimately failed. Orion was once expected to be “GPT-5,” but OpenAI ultimately positioned it as a bridge between GPT-4 and the next-generation GPT-5.

Internal sources indicate that despite OpenAI investing unprecedented resources into training, the new model’s performance did not significantly surpass GPT-4 as expected, and in some areas, it even stagnated. This “diminishing returns” phenomenon suggests that simply increasing data volume may no longer be enough to push the limits of current neural network technology.

Market Share Plummets, Customers Shift to Gemini

OpenAI’s dominant market position is rapidly eroding. Data shows that ChatGPT’s market share has dropped from 86% at the beginning of 2025 to 65% in January 2026, mainly lost to Google’s Gemini. The average daily user engagement on ChatGPT has shrunk from 27 minutes to 21 minutes. Leveraging its powerful ecosystem and multimodal technology, Google has gained ground in real-time information and mobile applications; meanwhile, open-source models from China and Anthropic’s Claude are also closing in. Even in image generation, Google’s Nano Banana Pro has triggered emergency responses within OpenAI, indicating that its technological lead is no longer secure. These threats from all directions have forced OpenAI to begin testing ads in both free and paid versions, seen as a last resort to sustain operations.

Unpayable Black Hole, Investors Hesitate

OpenAI’s financial statements reveal enormous operational pressures. Despite annual recurring revenue reaching $13 billion, projected losses in 2026 are as high as $14 billion—far exceeding market expectations. OpenAI has pledged to invest trillions of dollars over the next eight years to build data centers and has signed huge contracts with Oracle, but current revenue accounts for only a tiny fraction of expenses. Market rumors suggest that without new funding rounds, the company could face bankruptcy by 2027. Even more concerning, investor confidence is wavering. Key partner NVIDIA appears cautious when asked about their rumored $100 billion investment, with ColdFusion citing a news clip where Jensen Huang repeatedly emphasized that NVIDIA has never promised to invest that amount and is only conducting phased assessments. Compared to Google, which has stable cash flow, OpenAI’s profit outlook remains highly uncertain, making it particularly vulnerable.

Founder Altman’s Character Under Scrutiny

Beyond technical and financial issues, CEO Sam Altman’s personal integrity is also under strict examination. Tracing his entrepreneurial history—from the early social map app Loopt, which allegedly exposed user data, to scraping Reddit content, and accusations from OpenAI board member Ilya Sutskever of dishonesty—many former employees have also revealed that they were monitored after leaving. OpenAI fears negative information leaking out, raising doubts about Altman’s character. He once promised that OpenAI could cure cancer, but under financial pressure, the organization shifted from a nonprofit to a private company chasing valuation. Even its closest ally, Microsoft, reportedly faces cracks; according to the Financial Times, Microsoft’s AI division CEO Mustafa Suleyman stated that Microsoft is pursuing self-sufficiency and gradually distancing itself from OpenAI. If these integrity issues continue to escalate, they could directly impact talent retention and future funding opportunities.

This article, “Financial Black Hole and Technological Stagnation: OpenAI Faces Imminent Bankruptcy,” first appeared on Chain News ABMedia.