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| ▲ | jcranmer 14 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| IIRC, current estimates are that OpenAI is losing as much money a year as Uber or Amazon lost in their entire lifetime of unprofitability. Also, both Uber and Amazon spent their unprofitable years having a clear roadmap to profitability. OpenAI's roadmap to profitability is "???" |
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| ▲ | bdangubic 13 hours ago | parent [-] | | I have lived through Amazon’s rags to riches and there was never a clear plan to profitability. Vast majority of people were questioning sanity of anyone investing in Amazon. I am not saying OpenAI is Amazon but am saying I have seen this before where masses are going “oh business is bad, losses are huge, where is path to profitability…” | | |
| ▲ | esafak 9 hours ago | parent [-] | | Your recollection is hazy. Bezos chose not to be profitable in order to grow the company, and reap greater rewards in the future. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/wjLs22dNOCE | | |
| ▲ | tptacek 6 hours ago | parent [-] | | I don't know either way but every company does this, it's not saying anything meaningful to say that a new company is taking an "investment year" or two or ten. I do know that in the late aughts, people were writing stories about how Amazon was a charity run on behalf of the American consumer by the finance industry. | | |
| ▲ | mrwrong an hour ago | parent [-] | | and those stories were in the short run correct, since Amazon and Uber succeeded by massively undercutting existing businesses. reel customers in with charity, then turn the screws. what business is ChatGPT undercutting? |
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| ▲ | oh_my_goodness 14 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| To become the next Uber, do I just need to run huge losses? |
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| ▲ | bdangubic 13 hours ago | parent [-] | | I wouldn’t but path to success can clearly come from running 10-digit losses for a loooong time, no? | | |
| ▲ | oh_my_goodness 13 hours ago | parent [-] | | I think you're saying that just running up huge losses is sufficient to create a successful company? But that you personally wouldn't want to run up huge losses? Not sure. | | |
| ▲ | bdangubic 10 hours ago | parent [-] | | nah, I am saying that many (super) successful businesses ran in red financially for a very long time. I would not run a business that way but I am also (fortunately) not a CEO of a multibillion dollar company |
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| ▲ | toxic72 14 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| To my knowledge Amazon never debt financed their ops like this |
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| ▲ | oh_my_goodness 14 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Amazon did borrow money, for a long time. | |
| ▲ | dylan604 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Where did their financing come from then? | | |
| ▲ | samx18 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | They had a cash-cow called AWS to keep the retail business afloat | | |
| ▲ | dylan604 8 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Somebody must not be old enough to remember Amazon before AWS. Maybe you also don’t remember that Amazon started selling books before becoming the world’s largest fencing for selling stolen merch. They used to be the butt of many jokes for losing so much money for so many years while they expanded warehouses. | |
| ▲ | bdangubic 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | not right away |
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