A growing coalition of advocacy groups is mobilizing to block OpenAI's controversial plans to abandon its nonprofit structure, arguing the AI giant has betrayed its founding mission while reaping tax benefits. The EyesOnOpenAI coalition, featuring TechEquity and LatinoProsperity leaders, represents the most organized opposition yet to OpenAI's quest for a traditional corporate structure that would unlock billions in funding and pave the way for an eventual IPO.
OpenAI finds itself under siege from an unlikely quarter: a coalition of advocacy groups determined to hold the world's most valuable AI company accountable to its nonprofit roots. The EyesOnOpenAI coalition, led by Catherine Bracy of TechEquity and Orson Aguilar of LatinoProsperity, represents the most coordinated challenge yet to CEO Sam Altman's plans to transform the company into a traditional for-profit entity.
The battle centers on OpenAI's original 2015 charter, which established the company as a nonprofit specifically to prevent investors from steering artificial intelligence development toward potentially harmful paths. That structure survived the dramatic 2023 board coup that briefly ousted Altman, but now faces its greatest existential threat as the company eyes massive funding rounds and an eventual public offering.
"OpenAI has enjoyed the advantages of being a nonprofit while drifting away from its mission," Bracy and Aguilar argue in The Verge's Decoder podcast. Their coalition has launched an open letter campaign demanding transparency around the restructuring process and questioning whether the company has fulfilled its charitable obligations.
The timing couldn't be more critical. OpenAI recently explored a $500 billion valuation in potential employee share sales, underscoring the massive financial incentives driving the restructuring push. Yet the company's nonprofit status has provided significant tax advantages while positioning it as a public-interest organization rather than a traditional tech startup.
Altman has defended the proposed changes, writing in a May blog post that the restructuring would create "the largest and most effective nonprofit in history." However, declined to comment specifically on the coalition's campaign, referring instead to Altman's earlier statements.