SoftBank SB Energy gave OpenAI $5.5 billion in stock warrants

Draft IPO documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal reveal that SB Energy — the data center company whose majority owner is SoftBank's Masayoshi Son — issued OpenAI stock warrants carrying an estimated value of $5.5 billion as an incentive to bring the AI company on as a tenant.

At the time of their January issuance, the warrants carried a $3.6 billion valuation; by June's end, that figure had climbed to $5.5 billion, the documents show. SB Energy expects to make its IPO filing public as soon as this week, according to the Journal, with bankers targeting a listing as soon as next month that could raise between $5 billion and $7 billion.

The draft documents are the first to lay out in detail how SB Energy is financially intertwined with SoftBank and OpenAI, the two companies that serve as both its planned tenants and its investors. SoftBank is additionally one of OpenAI's major investors.

OpenAI put $500 million into SB Energy earlier this year and, once the IPO closes, is projected to own somewhere in the low single digits as a percentage of the company's shares. Going forward, the warrants would be unlocked in stages as SB Energy's market capitalization reaches predetermined thresholds. The documents also show that SB Energy has pledged to spend at least $50 million on OpenAI products and services, among them ChatGPT Enterprise, by 2028.