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Microsoft makes $7.6B from OpenAI as AI bets pay off
29 Jan 2026

Microsoft's long-standing and sometimes tumultuous partnership with OpenAI is proving to be extremely profitable.

The tech giant has quietly made a whopping $7.6 billion from its investment in the AI lab, according to its latest quarterly earnings report.

The financial windfall highlights just how important artificial intelligence (AI) has become for Microsoft's growth strategy.

Microsoft's investment in OpenAI
Financial gains

While the exact details of their revenue-sharing agreement remain unconfirmed, it is widely believed that OpenAI shares about 20% of its revenue with Microsoft.

The software giant has invested over $13 billion in the AI lab and is now reaping the rewards.

According to Bloomberg, OpenAI is currently seeking new funding at an eye-popping valuation of $750 billion to $830 billion.

OpenAI's commitment boosts Microsoft's balance sheet
Strategic partnership

The partnership was restructured last September when OpenAI became a public benefit corporation.

As part of the new deal, OpenAI committed to buying another $250 billion worth of Azure cloud services.

This promise appears on Microsoft's balance sheet as "commercial remaining performance obligations," or revenue that has been contracted but not yet realized.

Microsoft's balance sheet reflects OpenAI's commitment
Financial impact

The value of these obligations jumped to $625 billion from $392 billion in the previous quarter.

Microsoft revealed that 45% of this amount is associated with OpenAI, giving a rare insight into how much the AI lab relies on Azure infrastructure.

The financial figures show how crucial the partnership has been for both companies' growth strategies.

Anthropic's role in Microsoft's earnings report
AI expansion

Anthropic also played a part in Microsoft's earnings report. Microsoft's commercial bookings soared by 230%, partly due to its growing relationship with the rival AI company.

In November, Microsoft announced a $5 billion investment in Anthropic and an agreement for $30 billion worth of Azure compute capacity, with more likely to come later on.

Microsoft's capital expenditures and revenue growth
Financial strategy

Microsoft spent $37.5 billion on capital expenditures during the quarter, with two-thirds going toward short-lived assets such as GPUs and CPUs for AI workloads on Azure.

The company posted $81.3 billion in revenue, beating Wall Street's expectations of $80.27 billion and marking a 17% year-on-year (YoY) increase.

Microsoft Cloud revenue crossed the $50 billion mark for the first time in a single quarter, highlighting its strong performance across all business units except Windows devices and Xbox content/services.