OpenAI launched new information Monday displaying enterprise utilization of its AI instruments has surged dramatically over the previous yr, with ChatGPT message quantity rising 8x since November 2024 and employees reporting they’re saving as much as an hour day by day. The findings arrive per week after CEO Sam Altman despatched an inside “code red” memo in regards to the aggressive menace of Google.
The timing underscores OpenAI’s push to reframe its place because the enterprise AI chief, even because it faces mounting pressures. Whereas near 36% of U.S. companies are ChatGPT Enterprise prospects in comparison with 14.3% for Anthropic, per Ramp AI Index, nearly all of OpenAI’s income nonetheless comes from shopper subscriptions — a base that’s being threatened by Google’s Gemini. OpenAI additionally should compete in opposition to rival AI agency Anthropic — whose income comes primarily from B2B gross sales – and, more and more, open-weight mannequin suppliers for enterprise prospects.
The AI large has dedicated $1.4 trillion to infrastructure commitments over the subsequent few years, making enterprise development important to its enterprise mannequin.
“If you think about it from an economic growth perspective, consumers really matter,” Ronnie Chatterji, OpenAI’s chief economist, stated throughout a briefing. “But when you look at historically transformative technologies like the steam engine, it’s when firms adopt and scale these technologies that you really see the biggest economic benefits.”
OpenAI’s new findings recommend that adoption amongst bigger enterprises will not be solely rising however turning into extra built-in into workflows. Staff aren’t solely sending extra messages — organizations utilizing OpenAI’s API (its developer interface) are consuming 320 occasions extra “reasoning tokens” than they had been a yr in the past, suggesting corporations are utilizing AI for extra advanced problem-solving. That, or they’re experimenting closely with the brand new tech and burning via tokens, with out essentially getting long-term worth.
That enhance in reasoning tokens, which correlates with elevated vitality utilization, might be costly for corporations and subsequently not sustainable in the long run. TechCrunch has requested OpenAI about enterprise funds allocation for AI and the sustainability of this development fee.
Past uncooked utilization metrics, OpenAI can be seeing adjustments in how corporations deploy its instruments. Use of customized GPTs — which corporations use to codify institutional information into assistants or automate workflows — jumped 19x this yr, now accounting for 20% of enterprise messages, the report discovered. OpenAI pointed to digital financial institution buyer BBVA, which it says commonly makes use of over 4,000 customized GPTs.
Techcrunch occasion
San Francisco
|
October 13-15, 2026
“It shows you how much people are really able to take this powerful technology and start to customize it to the things that are useful to them,” stated Brad Lightcap, OpenAI’s chief working officer, through the briefing.
These integrations have led to significant time financial savings, in line with OpenAI. Contributors reported saving 40 to 60 minutes per day with OpenAI’s enterprise merchandise — although that won’t embrace time spent studying the programs, prompting, or correcting AI output.
The report discovered that enterprise employees are additionally more and more leveraging AI instruments to increase their very own capabilities. Three quarters of these surveyed say AI allows them to do issues, together with technical duties, they couldn’t do earlier than. OpenAI reported a 36% enhance in coding-related messages exterior of engineering, IT, and analysis groups.
Whereas OpenAI drove dwelling the concept that its expertise is democratizing entry to expertise, it’s essential to notice that extra vibe coding may result in extra safety vulnerabilities and different flaws. When requested about this, Lightcap pointed to OpenAI’s current launch of its agentic safety researcher Aardvark, which is in personal beta, as a possible option to detect bugs, vulnerabilities, and exploits.
OpenAI’s report additionally discovered that even probably the most lively ChatGPT Enterprise customers aren’t utilizing probably the most superior instruments accessible to them, like information evaluation, reasoning, or search. Through the briefing, Lightcap mused that this was as a result of totally adopting AI programs requires a mindset shift and deeper integration with enterprise information and processes. Adoption of superior options will take time, he stated, as corporations retool workflows to raised perceive what’s attainable.
Lightcap and Chatterji additionally pressured a report discovering that confirmed a “growing divide in AI adoption,” with some “frontier” employees utilizing extra instruments extra typically to avoid wasting extra time than the “laggards.”
“There are firms that still very much see these systems as a piece of software, something I can buy and give to my teams and that’s kind of the end of it,” Lightcap stated. “And then there are companies that are really starting to embrace it, almost more like an operating system. It’s basically a re-platforming of a lot of the company’s operations.”
OpenAI’s management — which actually feels the stress of the agency’s $1.4 trillion in infrastructure commitments — framed this as a possibility for laggards to catch up. For employees coaching AI programs to copy their work, “catching up” may really feel extra like a countdown.
