On Monday, the U.S. Pentagon announced it will sign a $200 million defense contract with OpenAI to develop artificial intelligence tools to address critical national security challenges.
Written by: Bao Yilong, Wall Street Journal
OpenAI enters the military-industrial market, the AI arms race behind the $200 million military contract.
On June 16, the U.S. Pentagon announced it will sign a $200 million defense contract with OpenAI to develop artificial intelligence tools to address critical national security challenges. The Pentagon stated in a press release:
Under this project, the contractor will develop cutting-edge AI prototype capabilities to address key national security challenges in the operational and enterprise domains.
This is the first contract listed by OpenAI on the Department of Defense website, with work primarily to be conducted in the Washington area, expected to be completed by July 2026. OpenAI stated that the program will provide customized AI models, technical support, and product roadmap information to U.S. government agencies.
According to media reports, although OpenAI emphasized in an official blog post that the primary application scenarios of the contract will focus on improving military medical care, simplifying project procurement data analysis, and proactive cyber defense in administrative areas, and promised that "all use cases must comply with OpenAI's usage policies and guidelines," the wording "warfighting domains" in the Pentagon's statement leaves significant room for imagination in the market.
To systematically advance such cooperation, OpenAI announced the establishment of a new department called "OpenAI for Government," with this Department of Defense contract being the inaugural project of the initiative.
Arms Race: AI Giants Compete for the Defense Pie
OpenAI's actions are not isolated events.
Just last December, OpenAI announced a partnership with defense technology startup Anduril to deploy advanced AI systems for "national security missions," while Anduril itself secured a $100 million defense contract that same month.
The competitive atmosphere is also palpable among rivals. OpenAI's main competitor, Anthropic, had earlier announced a collaboration with big data companies Palantir and Amazon to provide its AI models to U.S. defense and intelligence agencies.
Meanwhile, as OpenAI's most critical infrastructure partner, Microsoft's Azure OpenAI service received authorization from the U.S. Defense Information Systems Agency in April this year to handle "secret" level classified information. This paves the way for OpenAI's technology to enter more sensitive defense areas.
From a purely financial perspective, this $200 million may be just a drop in the bucket for OpenAI.
According to the latest data, as of June this year, the company's annualized revenue has soared to $10 billion. In March this year, the company sought up to $40 billion in funding in a financing round led by SoftBank, with a valuation targeting $300 billion. Additionally, the "Stargate" project, announced jointly with President Trump to build U.S. AI infrastructure, has an investment scale of up to $500 billion.
However, the symbolic significance of this Pentagon contract far exceeds its monetary value. Analysts believe it not only opens a new revenue source for OpenAI that is almost unaffected by economic cycles but, more importantly, it signifies OpenAI's formal entry into this arms race.
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