OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar tells employees that annualized revenue in July topped all of Q2

Sarah Friar, CFO of OpenAI, speaking on CNBC's Squawk Box at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on Jan. 21st, 2026. Oscar Molina | CNBCAs OpenAI chases rival Anthropic in the enterprise and tries to sustain growth in the face of new competition from cheaper open-source alternatives, the artificial intelligence company is seeking to reassure staffers that the business remains healthy.In an internal meeting with employees on Wednesday, finance chief Sarah Friar and board chair Bret Taylor touted OpenAI's revenue growth and addressed competition with Anthropic, CNBC has learned. Friar said OpenAI's annualized recurring revenue in July exceeded the entire second quarter. "And Q2 was no slouch," Friar said, according to a partial transcript of the meeting that was reviewed by CNBC. Friar and Taylor said momentum was driven by the release of the company's GPT-5.6 series of models, its new enterprise agent called ChatGPT Work, and growing adoption of its AI coding tool, Codex. OpenAI is under pressure to justify its $852 billion valuation as it gears up for a potentially massive IPO. The company faces a constantly changing competitive landscape that includes Anthropic and Goog...