A $6.6 Billion Payday for OpenAI Employees

Summary

WSJ Tech News Briefing – May 12, 2026

Episode Title: A $6.6 Billion Payday for OpenAI Employees
Host: Imani Moiz
Featured Guests: WSJ Reporters Jared Mitovich & Berber Jin

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Episode Overview

This episode explores two major facets of the AI boom:

1. Unexpected Winners in AI Infrastructure: Companies far removed from software—including glassmakers, toilet manufacturers, and construction equipment giants—are profiting massively from the AI buildout.
2. Massive Payouts for OpenAI Employees: OpenAI staffers are already turning paper wealth into real millions via private stock sales, even before the expected blockbuster IPO.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

I. Surprising Beneficiaries of the AI Boom (00:19–05:22)

Traditional Companies Going High-Tech

• Unexpected Players:
  • Toto (01:27): Known for toilets, now seeing demand for their advanced ceramics (used in semiconductor manufacturing).
    • Quote (Jared Mitovich, 01:27):
      “It’s a funny story of a business making legitimate strides from primarily a toilet and housing equipment company into one that’s now kind of at the precipice of this major AI infrastructure explosion.”
  • Corning (02:20): A 175-year-old glass company, long-associated with Edison’s light bulbs, is now a key player in fiber optics for data centers.
    • “They were involved with Thomas Edison’s light bulb to now embracing their fiber optics and cabling business because that’s the preferred way of connecting these intensive data centers.” (Jared Mitovich, 02:20)

Why Infrastructure Companies are Seen as Safer Bets

• Stability and Trust:
  • Firms like Corning and Caterpillar have deep business roots and established reputations.
    • “These companies have history to them. They do not just show up on the scene. … I think they might prove to be a more stable bet in the long term.” (Jared Mitovich, 02:43)
• Pick-and-Shovel Play:
  • Such firms are likened to the ‘pick and shovel’ sellers of the gold rush era.
    • “Caterpillar is the literal pick and shovel trade. Right now, they’re literally building up the world of infrastructure that can support the intensive needs of artificial intelligence.” (Jared Mitovich, 04:28)

Varying Degrees of AI-Driven Growth

• Transformational vs. Speculative:
  • Some companies (e.g., Caterpillar) are expanding adjacent lines to tap the AI demand (power generation for data centers).
  • Others (e.g., Allbirds rebranding as Newbirds AI) are embracing AI in name only, seeing stock spikes followed by corrections.
    • “Allbirds… had this dizzying 500% one day stock growth after it announced that it was rebranding itself as Newbirds AI. And that’s a wholesale pivot. Their shoes don’t carry any AI in them now…” (Jared Mitovich, 03:34)

Bubble Worries

• Gold Rush Enthusiasm Could Lead to a Pullback:
  • The fervor is so intense that some investors fear a coming correction.
    • “You just look at the growth here and it’s just so explosive that there might be a turning point to come.” (Jared Mitovich, 05:04)

II. OpenAI’s $6.6 Billion Employee Payday (06:20–11:47)

Early Employees Hit the Jackpot

• Massive Pre-IPO Wealth Creation:
  • Over 600 OpenAI employees recently sold shares worth $6.6 billion, averaging about $11 million per seller.
    • “More than 600 current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion worth of shares. That nets out to roughly 11 million per person.” (Berber Jin, 07:02)

Why This Is Unique in Tech History

• AI’s Outsized Rewards:
  • The scale and speed of wealth creation in AI eclipses previous booms (dotcom, Google, Facebook).
  • Even rank-and-file technical staff are seeing “insane” paydays—sometimes up to $30 million or more.
    • “If you are in any mid or senior level position… you’re getting compensated kind of insane amounts by any standard measure.” (Berber Jin, 07:47)
    • “If you look at how fast and extreme OpenAI is… if you join OpenAI in 2019, the value of your share price has increased by more than 100 fold.” (Berber Jin, 10:36)

How Employees Can Sell Before the IPO

• The Tender Offer Mechanism:
  • Traditionally, employees would have to wait for an IPO—and then a ‘lockup’ period—but startups now offer “tender offers” allowing earlier liquidity.
    • “One thing that’s changed in recent years is that startups have stayed private for a lot longer. And so companies have started to create these tender offers where they basically allow their employees to sell shares before an IPO.” (Berber Jin, 08:58)

Impact on the Bay Area

• Society and Real Estate:
  • The sudden influx of wealth is fueling housing cost surges and a widening social divide, especially in San Francisco.
    • “There is a lot of talk about how the AI boom is already driving up rental prices, it’s driving up the housing market, it’s generating concern about like a growing class divide in the city...” (Berber Jin, 09:54)
  • Many have more money than they know what to do with; some are turning to philanthropy.
    • “I’ve come across employees who they sold the full $30 million last fall and then had way more left over that they could sell at a later date or some of them even chose to just donate it to charity.” (Berber Jin, 11:23)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Old Companies Riding the AI Wave:
  “So it’s a funny story of a business making legitimate strides from primarily a toilet and housing equipment company into one that's now… at the precipice of this major AI infrastructure explosion.”
  (Jared Mitovich, 01:27)

• On AI’s Unprecedented Wealth Creation:
  “If you look at how fast and extreme OpenAI is… if you join OpenAI in 2019, the value of your share price has increased by more than 100 fold.”
  (Berber Jin, 10:36)

• On the ‘Pick and Shovel’ Analogy:
  “Caterpillar is the literal pick and shovel trade. Right now, they’re literally building up the world of infrastructure…”
  (Jared Mitovich, 04:28)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:19–05:22: Unexpected AI infrastructure winners (Toto, Corning, Caterpillar, Allbirds)
• 06:20–07:36: OpenAI employees’ $6.6B share sale explained
• 07:36–09:44: How the mechanism works and why it’s unique in tech
• 09:54–11:47: Social impact and ripple effects in the Bay Area

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Episode Takeaways

• The AI buildout is minting not just new tech titans, but also enriching companies with zero prior claim to the software revolution.
• OpenAI’s pre-IPO payouts are setting a new precedent for employee wealth in Silicon Valley, with repercussions already felt in the Bay Area’s society and real estate.
• The AI gold rush is in full swing—for infrastructure providers and technical staff alike.

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For more, listen to WSJ Tech News Briefing or read the full coverage at wsj.com.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Welcome to Tech News briefing. It's Tuesday, May 12th. I'm Imani Moiz for the Wall Street Journal. What do bulldozers, iPhone, glass and Japan's most popular toilets have in common? The company that make them are reaping the benefits of the AI boom. We're taking a look at the unexpected winners of the race to build out AI infrastructure. Then we're turning to some expected beneficiaries of AI mania. Current and former employees of OpenAI who are trading in their equity for millions of dollars. Why it's happening now before the company goes public, and what it could mean for the rest of Silicon Valley. But first, investors looking to cash in on the AI boom are looking beyond chatbots and chip makers. Companies supplying key materials are powering not just the AI infrastructure buildout, but also the stock market. WSJ reporter Jared Mitovich joins to walk us through the surprising names getting a boost from the AI trade. So Jared, your story is full of these unexpected AI winners. What are some of the strangest or most surprising companies getting swept up in this rally right now?

[C]

Sure, so I think the strangest one probably has to be Toto. It's this Japanese toilet maker that's actually been around for a while. You know, my grandpa has a Toto toilet and he loves it. But they've also got this other line of business in advanced ceramics and they're now totally building that out, trying to embrace it as their next area for growth because the advanced ceramics are actually in high demand among semiconductor companies and those involved with the AI buildouts because of the specialized material and manufacturing required that Toto just so happens to specialize in. So. So it's a funny story of a business making legitimate strides from primarily a toilet and housing equipment company into one that's now kind of at the precipice of this major AI infrastructure explosion.

[B]

Something that really jumped out to me in your story was this 175 year old glass company that doesn't sound like a tech company at all. How did they get involved in this?

[C]

So Corning is one of the companies that's also made strides and kind of pivoting. They were involved with Thomas Edison's light bulb to now embracing their fiber optics and cabling business because that's the preferred way of connecting these intensive Data centers.

[B]

And some investors seem to believe that investing in these infrastructure suppliers are a safer bet than betting which AI model or chatbot will ultimately win. Why?

[C]

These companies have history to them. They do not just show up on the scene. They're not just a startup. A company like Corning's been around almost two centuries. A company like Caterpillar, another one that I reported on in my story, they're well known for their yellow bulldozers and dump trucks and now they're exploding their power generation business. So these companies are trusted suppliers, trusted partners of many in the business world. And I think they might prove to be a more stable bet in the long term because data center construction is only just now ramping up. It's hard to believe when you take stock of how much of the electric grid it might require to power these buildings, the supplies and the materials and the bits and pieces that go into this, those are going to be in high demand for a while.

[B]

And how much of these companies growth is actually being driven by AI right now? Is this the side business investors are getting excited about or something more transformational?

[C]

You're certainly seeing a little bit of both with Caterpillar. They have a power generation business. It's not their biggest business line, but they're now embracing it because of its connections to AI. On the other hand, you see Allbirds, which had this dizzying 500% one day stock growth after it announced that it was rebranding itself as Newbirds AI. And that's a wholesale pivot. Their shoes don't carry any AI in them now and they're trying to do something different entirely. So those are the kinds of flavors that you're seeing of companies here getting caught up in this AI wave. And I will say if you look at the share price performance of Caterpillar, it's showing some more health than Allbirds, which might have had that dizzying rise, but is now coming back down to earth as investors really want to see signs that companies are not only transforming themselves and investing in AI, but also monetizing it and turning it into return on investment.

[B]

And some of your sources likened the AI trade to the gold rush. To what extent does that metaphor hold true?

[C]

It's hard to argue that it doesn't. There's just so much investor enthusiasm around basically any company with some hand or finger in the AI world right now. These are commonly referred to as sort of the pick and shovel companies of a major build out. As one investment officer put it to me, Caterpillar is the literal pick and shovel trade. Right now, they're literally building up the world of infrastructure that can support the intensive needs of artificial intelligence. So you're seeing investors really pile money into these stocks that are more second and third order. When we think about who's going to benefit the most from AI, whether, you know, that'll actually turn into something sustainable in the long term is yet to be seen. And even among those that I spoke with, there's certainly some thinking that there could be a pullback at some point. You just look at the growth here and it's just so explosive that there might be a turning point to come.

[B]

That was WSJ reporter Jared Mitovich. Are you investing in the AI infrastructure buildout? Where are you putting your money? If you're a listener on Spotify, leave us a comment and let us know. Coming up, OpenAI employees are some of the earliest winners of the AI boom. After selling millions of dollars worth of shares in the company, we're bringing you an exclusive look inside of the massive paydays that are generating more wealth than Silicon Valley has ever seen before. That's after the break.

[A]

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[B]

OpenAI and anthropic are gearing up for what will likely be some of the largest IPOs in history, allowing their thousands of employees to unload their stock, turning many of them into multimillionaires. But at OpenAI, that's already happening. WSJ reporter Berber Jin joins us to walk through his exclusive reporting on why employees are selling shares now and what some of them are doing with the money. And before we get started, we should note that News Corp. The owner of the Wall Street Journal, has a content licensing partnership with OpenAI. Berber, your story describes OpenAI jobs as essentially lottery tickets. And some current and former employees are cashing in. Just how much money are we talking about?

[D]

So we're talking about a lot of money. OpenAI required employees to wait at least two years before they could sell their shares. And so last October, when this huge financing round happened, that was the first time a lot of employees who joined right after ChatGPT launched were eligible to sell their shares. More than 600 current and former OpenAI employees sold $6.6 billion worth of shares. That nets out to roughly 11 million per person. So definitely a lot of money we're talking about here.

[B]

No previous Tech boom has created this much wealth for employees before a public listing. Why is the AI boom so different from the dot com era or even the rise of companies like Google and Facebook?

[D]

There's a lot of money in tech, but I think there's especially a lot of money in AI. And so if you think back to the talent wars last year that Meta kicked off, you have some top AI researchers who are receiving pay packages north of $300 million. And it's not just like the top, top engineers and researchers. I think if you are in any mid or senior level position with an OpenAI working on a more technical role, you're getting compensated kind of insane amounts by any standard measure. And the interesting thing about this financing where a lot of employees sold their shares, was that a lot of them who were making all the way up to $30 million were kind of like rank and file employees. They were definitely more senior, they were definitely in more technical roles. But it just kind of shows how the AI boom is going to make a pretty wide swath of employees very wealthy and at a scale much greater than anything we've seen in the past.

[B]

It was previously not only unheard of, but also kind of impossible for tech employees to have a payday like this before an ipo. Can you talk a little bit about the mechanism that's allowing this to happen now?

[D]

Yeah. So traditionally employees would have to wait until an ipo, even after an ipo, before they could sell their shares. A lot of companies have like lockup periods after IPO where employees have to wait sometimes up to 180 days before they can sell their shares. And that's always very nerve wracking because the stock could plummet and then you just wouldn't be able to make as much money as you expected. But one thing that's changed in recent years is that startups have stayed private for a lot longer. And so companies have started to create these tender offers where they basically allow their employees to sell shares before an ipo. And it's allowing employees to kind of cash out when the company's future is still very much in the air and before they've even gone public.

[B]

Tech has long been a lucrative field, particularly for founders. And now you talked about how this is spreading to more rank and file employees. What impact is this having?

[D]

In San Francisco, where I live, there is a lot of talk about how the AI boom is already driving up rental prices, it's driving up the housing market, it's generating concern about like a growing class divide in the city where you have, you know, like a couple thousand employees who are just made extraordinarily rich because of the AI boost boom. And I think that will be even more the case after these companies ipo. You can expect a lot of money to just become unlocked. And so it'll be interesting to see how that affects just like living in San Francisco, where a lot of these AI researchers and engineers live and in the broader Bay Area because it's a scale of wealth creation that is new even for a city like San Francisco. You meet a lot of people in San Francisco who are just kind of got on the right train. They're all very smart, talented employees, but they just happen to join Stripe or SpaceX or any other hot tech company at the right moment in time. What still kind of shocks me is just if you look at how fast and extreme OpenAI is. As an example, if you join OpenAI in 2019, the value of your share price has increased by more than 100 fold. And so that's what a lot of these employees are experiencing where if you were an early OpenAI employee, you definitely saw promise in the company and felt like it was a good place to build a career. But I don't think anyone could have imagined just how fast that company's share price has really grown. I've come across employees who they sold the full $30 million last fall and then had way more left over that they could sell at a later date or some of them even chose to just donate it to charity. So I think for even a lot of the employees who have gone on this kind of rocket ship, I mean, they don't even know what to do with the money because they have so much.

[B]

That was WSJ reporter Berber Jin. And that's it for Tech News Briefing. If you're a listener on Spotify, be sure to leave us a comment. Today's show was produced by supervising producer Katie Ferguson. I'm Imani Moiz for the Wall Street Journal. We'll be back later this morning with TNB Tech Minute. Thanks for listening.

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