OpenAI
Verified“US-incorporated, US-controlled, US-hosted AI.”
- Scale
- 800M+ weekly users
- Revenue
- $20B+ ARR
- Employees
- ~4,500
- Top shareholder
- Microsoft 27%
16 = midpoint of Control 14 & Data 17
Sovereignty Quadrant
Control ↑ who owns & governs the company · Data → where your data lives. Every dot is a company — click to open it.
Every number below traces to 13 sourced facts across 12 independent sources, last verified 2026-06-12. 3 open questions hold confidence at 88% — they lower confidence, never the score.
Control ↑
Who legally and economically controls the company
Legal & Jurisdiction
18
Operating entity is a Delaware PBC controlled by a US Delaware nonprofit; the EU presence (OpenAI Ireland Ltd) is a downstream subsidiary, not the locus of control. EU law reaches it via the Irish entity, but jurisdiction is fundamentally US.
Why 18? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
The for-profit operating entity, OpenAI Group PBC, was incorporated in Delaware as a public benefit corporation in October 2025.
Harvard Business Services / Delaware Division of Corporations · as of 2025-10-28
OpenAI is controlled by OpenAI, Inc., a Delaware nonprofit corporation (renamed the OpenAI Foundation), with the Delaware Attorney General as representative of beneficiaries.
State of Delaware (AG Jennings statement) · as of 2025-10-28
OpenAI Ireland Limited (Dublin) is the designated data controller for users in the EEA and Switzerland, giving the Irish DPC lead-authority oversight under GDPR.
Digital Watch Observatory · as of 2024-02-15
Control & Ownership
10
Voting control sits with a US nonprofit Foundation; the largest economic stake is Microsoft's 27%, and employees/investors hold 47%. There is no EU voting control and no EU economic majority.
Why 10? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
The OpenAI Foundation (US nonprofit) retains control of OpenAI Group with the sole power to appoint and remove the PBC board, and holds roughly a 26% equity stake worth about $130B.
State of Delaware (AG Jennings statement) · as of 2025-10-28
Microsoft holds about a 27% stake in OpenAI Group, making it the single largest economic shareholder.
NBC News · as of 2025-10-28
Remaining roughly 47% of equity is held by other investors plus current and former employees; ownership is US-centered with no EU bloc.
Bloomberg · as of 2025-10-29
Data →
Where your data lives and who can reach it
Data & Infrastructure
18
Compute is overwhelmingly US-hosted across Azure, Oracle/Stargate, AWS and Google. EU data residency exists but runs on a US hyperscaler (Azure), leaving CLOUD Act exposure, and applies to data at rest rather than all processing.
Why 18? 4 sourced facts · click to expand
OpenAI committed to purchasing roughly $250B in incremental Azure cloud services through ~2030, keeping Microsoft a core infrastructure provider.
European AI & Cloud Summit · as of 2025
OpenAI's Stargate program with Oracle targets ~4.5 GW of additional US data-center capacity under a reported ~$300B agreement.
Data Center Frontier · as of 2025
ChatGPT Enterprise/Edu and API customers can store customer content at rest in Europe, but the residency runs on US hyperscaler infrastructure (e.g. Azure Data Zones) and is at-rest only.
OpenAI · as of 2025-02-06
Because the EU residency offering relies on Azure, EU-stored data remains subject to US extraterritorial law (CLOUD Act) via the US provider.
Microsoft Azure Blog (Data Zones) · as of 2024
Operations & People
15
Headquarters and leadership are in San Francisco, the workforce and reporting are US-centered, and revenue is reported in USD. A Dublin office exists but is small relative to the US core.
Why 15? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
OpenAI's headquarters is in San Francisco (1455 3rd Street), and Sam Altman is CEO.
Wikipedia (OpenAI) · as of 2026
ChatGPT surpassed 800 million weekly active users, reflecting global reach run from a US-centered organization.
Nerdynav (ChatGPT statistics) · as of 2025-12
OpenAI's annualized revenue run-rate exceeded $20B in 2025, reported in USD from its US operations.
Get Panto (OpenAI statistics) · as of 2025
Aligned to the EU Commission’s official Cloud Sovereignty Framework (SEAL, Jun 2026) →
What we don’t know
3 open questions — they lower confidence, never the score
- ?
For EU residency customers, does processing/inference (not just data at rest) stay within the EU, and on which exact Azure or other regions?
Determines whether any meaningful data localization exists; if inference leaves the EU, the residency claim is largely cosmetic and infra score should stay low.
- ?
What share of OpenAI's actual production compute for European users runs in EU data centers versus the US?
Could nudge infra up if a substantial EU footprint exists, but all sourced commitments (Azure, Stargate, AWS) point heavily to the US.
- ?
Exact current headcount and revenue split between US and EU operations.
Affects operations precision; sourced figures are aggregate and largely US-centered, so the score is unlikely to move much.
EU Cloud Sovereignty Framework lens
The EU Cloud Sovereignty Framework / SEAL criteria target cloud service providers; applying them to OpenAI is an analogous mapping for comparability, not a certification or formal assessment.
Strategic
US-controlled, Microsoft-backed AI flagship; strategic direction set in San Francisco with no EU control lever.
Legal & jurisdictional
Delaware-incorporated PBC under a US nonprofit; EU reach exists only via OpenAI Ireland Ltd as GDPR data controller.
Data & AI
Consumer ChatGPT trains on conversations by default (opt-out); models and weights are US-controlled; EU data residency is limited and at-rest only.
Operational
HQ, leadership, workforce and USD reporting are US-centered; Dublin office is comparatively small.
Supply chain
Compute supply chain dominated by US vendors (Microsoft Azure, Oracle/Stargate, AWS, Google) and Nvidia hardware.
Technological
Proprietary US-developed models; no EU-controlled technology stack or open EU-hosted alternative for core models.
Security & compliance
Offers EU data residency, AES-256/TLS encryption, GDPR data-subject tooling and Irish DPC oversight — but on US infrastructure exposed to the CLOUD Act.
Environmental sustainability
No EU-specific, verified sustainability disclosure reviewed for this profile.
EU alternatives
Paris-headquartered EU AI lab with open-weight and commercial models; the leading EU-controlled alternative to OpenAI for chat and API use.
German enterprise/sovereign-AI provider focused on EU public sector and on-prem deployments; smaller model scale than OpenAI.
Profiled company itself — US-incorporated and US-controlled; listed for contrast, not as an EU-sovereign option.
How the method works
Methodology v2 (provisional): the score is the midpoint of two axes — Control (who owns and governs the company) and Data (where your data lives and who can reach it). Each axis is scored only on verified evidence; unknowns reduce confidence, never the score. Every input below is sourced; the weights and judgments are open to challenge.
Spotted an error? Every claim is sourced — challenge it and we correct the record.
- 2026-06-12 — Initial golden profile, authored from primary sources (human + AI review).
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Verified 2026-06-12 · Human + AI joint review (sources independently checked) · Methodology