What ChatGPTs 1 Million Paid Users Mean for Its Future Valuation and Pricing?

One of the best projects of OpenAI, ChatGPT, is again in highlights. This hype is not for its features but for its milestone of hitting 1 Million paid users on September 5. The AI chatbot was the beginning of AI’s dominance in the world, which led many popular businesses like Google, Meta, and many others to work on this technology. Moreover, with this milestone, it has cleared its dominance in the industry.

This new hype around AI is also visible in the crypto industry, as AI tokens are in the most demand. However, with the NVIDIA stock rout, they had also suffered in the market.

ChatGPT Bagged 1 Million Paid Users

The OpenAI provides both the free and paid versions, but 1 Million users have opted for the paid ones. It is because of its constant updates and introduction of more advanced features. The business introduced the Plus feature in February 2023, guaranteeing access to all the new updates, exclusive features, and even the latest features.

Moreover, back in August 2024, the Axios report revealed that the ChatGPT active user count doubled within a year, surpassing the 200 Million mark. However, despite the surged user base, the company valuation is not up to expectations, where only $3.4 billion was collected in sales up to May 2024.

On Analyzing Reuter’s April data, the paid user count has surged more than  67%, where it was only 600,00. Though the subscription is quite competitive, the Copilot Pro and Google AI cost the same, this AI bot is superior. Earlier, Gemini also rolled out ChatGPT voice mode rival but failed to beat demand. Moreover, ChatGPT has already taken the lead, thanks to its early introduction and constant updates.

Interestingly, during one survey of 4,700 premium users, the reports indicated that this AI bot is widely used among the corporate and educational sectors. With its research, drafting, and summarising properties, it is seen as a great tool for the industry, which is why this surge in user count came per expectations.

The Plus subscription costs $20 per month, which provides early access to the GPT-40, DALL-E 3, and many more. However, it is about to surge multifold in the future with the introduction of much more advanced AI models.

Open AI Valuation To Hit $100Billion With Subscription Surge

An insider has earlier revealed that OpenAI is planning to surge the subscription price for the upcoming AI models, which include the Strawberry, Orion, and other large language models.

This discussion came out in public after Elon Musk’s xAI, which is one of the biggest OpenAI competitors, launched the Grok-2AI assistant. This new version of the xAI grok is available for the X premium users. More importantly, as per the insider, the company plans to charge as high as $2,000 per month for newer models.

This reveals the company’s confidence in the AI bot as the $2,000/ month is quite high and can aid heavily in its valuation. Moreover, with Apple and NVIDIA showing interest in the OpenAI funding rounds, a valuation of $100 billion is anticipated.

Additionally, Microsoft, which already holds a 49% stake in this company, is also a part of the funding round. This is another significant milestone, as the tech giant has already invested $13 Billion in the last four years.

Final Thoughts

With the Strawberry and Orion in development, OpenAI plans to increase its Plus subscription from the current $20 to $2000/ month. This revelation comes into the spotlight after the ChatGPT paid users have surged to 1M. This is a  67% surge from its April data, as back then the same count was limited to $600K. Moreover, with the upcoming funding rounds, Microsoft, Apple, NVIDIA, and many prominent companies have shown interest in this platform. This might push the company’s valuation to the $100 Billion mark.