OpenAI Launches Major Bonus Plan to Retain Talent

OpenAI has introduced substantial retention bonuses for around 1,000 employees, about a third of its workforce, including researchers, engineers, and new hires, to address aggressive talent poaching by competitors such as Meta. The bonuses can reach up to $1.5 million per employee, distributed quarterly over two years as cash, stock, or both, with top researchers receiving multi-million-dollar packages and engineers hundreds of thousands. This initiative comes amid rivals offering compensation packages as high as $20 million annually to lure AI talent. OpenAI is also preparing a secondary stock sale that could value the company at up to $500 billion, more than doubling its previous $260 billion valuation, giving employees an opportunity for significant financial gain. CEO Sam Altman has cited competitive market dynamics as a reason for the enhanced compensation and suggested future increases may follow. The company's rapid revenue and user growth further reinforce its leadership in the AI field.