Shares held by the current and former employees at OpenAI have sold their shares worth $6.6 billion, the Bloomberg reported.

The shares were bought by investors including SoftBank, Dragoneer Investment Group, Thrive Capital, MGX, and T. Rowe Price.

This transaction valued OpenAI at $500 billion.

The bumper cash-outs to employees come amid fierce AI talent war raging in the industry.

In August, OpenAI had raised $8.3 billion in new funding, valuing the startup at $300 billion, The New York Times had reported. This is part of the Sam Altman-led company's broader strategy to secure $40 billion this year.

In a significant development earlier this month, OpenAI signed a non-binding agreement with Microsoft, its largest investor, paving the way for the AI startup to restructure into a for-profit company.

OpenAI has been active in this year as it launched its much awaited ChatGPT-5 and updated version of Sora while rolling out affordable subscription plan of ChatGPT in India and Indonesia.