Cohere vs OpenAI
Side-by-side equity comparison for employees weighing offers at Cohere or OpenAI. Valuations, funding history, headcount growth, and secondary-market context.
| Cohere | OpenAI | |
|---|---|---|
| Latest valuation | $7B | $852B |
| Latest round | Series D | Series E |
| Round date | January 2025 | October 2024 |
| Total raised | $970M | $13.3B |
| Founded | 2019 | 2015 |
| Headquarters | Toronto, Canada | San Francisco, CA |
| Employees | 846 | 7,829 |
| Employee YoY growth | +4% | +71% |
| Primary industry | Artificial Intelligence | Artificial Intelligence |
| Secondary-market price | $126.69 | $664.96 |
| Base-case equity multiple | 1x | — |
| Upside equity multiple | 2x | — |
| Lead investors | Nvidia, Oracle | Thrive Capital, SoftBank Vision Fund |
| Status | private | private |
Overview
Cohere builds enterprise-grade large language models and NLP tools that enable businesses to deploy generative AI for search, summarization, and conversational applications with a focus on data privacy and security.
OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company that develops general-purpose AI systems including GPT large language models and the ChatGPT consumer product.
Why we compare these
Cohere and OpenAI both appear on AI foundation model labs .
OpenAI appears on Sara's List 2024; Cohere is a direct competitor we track alongside it.
If you're evaluating offers at either one, the equity math depends on more than the headline valuation — dilution, strike price, time to liquidity, and concentration risk all matter. Use our equity compensation calculator and exit calculator to model your own numbers.