OpenAI: Models, Products & Builders

OpenAI

San Francisco AI lab behind ChatGPT, the GPT model family and Codex; restructured in 2025 as a public benefit corporation under the OpenAI Foundation.

In its own words

Superintelligence will be the most impactful technology humanity has ever inventedSource, July 5, 2023

OpenAI is an AI research and product company headquartered in San Francisco. It was founded in December 2015 as a nonprofit, with Sam Altman and Elon Musk among its original co-chairs. Altman has been CEO since 2019, with a brief interruption in November 2023 when the board removed and then reinstated him. Bret Taylor chairs the board.

The company’s stated mission is to “ensure artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity.” In October 2025, after approval from the California and Delaware attorneys general, OpenAI completed a recapitalisation: the nonprofit became the OpenAI Foundation, which retains control and appoints the board of the for-profit arm, now a public benefit corporation called OpenAI Group PBC.

OpenAI is best known for ChatGPT, the consumer assistant launched in late 2022, and for the GPT model family that powers it. In September 2026 the company began rolling out GPT-6 Astra, initially to approved testers and business customers, with cybersecurity safeguards. Its developer products include the API platform and Codex, a coding agent available in ChatGPT, the terminal, IDEs and a desktop app.

OpenAI has used the term “superintelligence” in official communications since at least July 2023, when it launched its Superalignment effort and stated that it “could arrive this decade.” In a January 2025 personal post, Altman wrote that the company was “beginning to turn our aim beyond that, to superintelligence in the true sense of the word.” The company has not claimed to have built such a system.

Key facts

Founded: December 2015, San Francisco
Leadership: Sam Altman (CEO), Greg Brockman (President), Bret Taylor (Chair)
Structure: OpenAI Group PBC, controlled by the OpenAI Foundation
Flagship products: ChatGPT, GPT model family, Codex, API platform

For current products and pricing see openai.com.

Models

GPTOpenAI's Generative Pre-trained Transformer model family, from the 2018 original to GPT-6 Astra, which powers ChatGPT and the OpenAI API.

Products and tools

ChatGPTOpenAI's consumer and business AI assistant, launched in late 2022, now combining chat, document work, Codex coding, voice and image generation.
CodexOpenAI's coding agent, available in ChatGPT, the cloud, a CLI, IDE extensions and a desktop app, for building, reviewing and shipping software.

Key builders

Sam AltmanCEO and co-founder
Ilya SutskeverCo-founder and chief scientist (former)
Mira MuratiChief Technology Officer (former)

Related research and guides

Super Intelligence vs AI: What Changed in 2026Executive Order 14434 told federal agencies to say Super Intelligence instead of AI. What changed, what did not, and how to read SI in a federal document.
What Is Super Intelligence (SI)?Super Intelligence now has two meanings: a U.S. federal label for AI since September 2026, and an older research concept. Here is how to tell them apart.
Super Intelligence Terminology Tracker: Who Has Adopted the TermA dated, sourced log of companies and government bodies that have officially adopted the term Super Intelligence in a name, mission, product or policy.
Who Is Building Super Intelligence?A sourced, dated map of the organizations that have publicly set out to build Super Intelligence, ranked by how explicitly they have adopted the goal.