OpenAI considers drastic token price cuts to fend off Anthropic

OpenAI is considering sharp reductions in the prices it charges for AI tokens as it seeks to win customers from rival Anthropic, The Wall Street Journal News Corp ↗ 0.73% reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter.Reuters

The discussions remain ongoing, according to the report, and come as both companies prepare for initial public offerings that could value each at or near $1 trillion.reuters+1

Enterprise Cost Concerns Mount

The potential price cuts follow weeks of growing unease among business customers over soaring AI expenses. At an enterprise event in early June, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman acknowledged that costs had become "a huge issue" for companies, noting the shift happened rapidly.India Today+1

"That went from, at the beginning of this year, an issue that never came up — people were totally happy with the amount they were spending — to all of a sudden, a huge issue," Altman said. He referenced a now-common refrain among clients: "My company spent my entire 2026 budget in Q1, can you make this more efficient?"Business Insider+1

Companies including Uber and Walmart have begun capping employee AI usage, while Amazon Amazon.com, Inc. ↘ 0.94% reportedly shut down an internal token leaderboard after costs spiraled. One company reportedly spent roughly $500 million on Claude AI usage in a single month.Facebookapp+1

IPO Pressures and a Crowded Market

The pricing deliberations come at a sensitive moment. OpenAI filed IPO paperwork with the SEC on June 8, days after Anthropic announced its own confidential filing on June 1. OpenAI is targeting a valuation of up to $1 trillion, while Anthropic closed a funding round at $965 billion.wsj+2

Both companies face questions about profitability. OpenAI indicated during its latest fundraising that it does not expect to achieve profitability until 2030. The Wall Street Journal reported in April that OpenAI's CFO Sarah Friar had expressed concerns internally about whether revenue growth could keep pace with computing commitments.reuters+2

The competitive landscape has only intensified. Chinese AI lab DeepSeek permanently slashed prices on its flagship model by 75% in May, offering rates up to nine times cheaper than American rivals. Meanwhile, Anthropic overtook OpenAI in valuation and, according to some reports, briefly in enterprise revenue growth.sherwood+2

Any price war would further pressure margins at companies already burning through cash to fund massive data center buildouts — a tension that investors will scrutinize closely as both firms seek public market debuts later this year.