Key takeaways OpenAI CEO Sam Altman declared a "code red" in an internal memo to prioritize ChatGPT improvements amid intensifying competition from Google's Gemini 3. The company is delaying advertisi...
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told employees the company is declaring a "code red" to rapidly improve ChatGPT as competition from Google and other artificial intelligence rivals intensifies, according to an internal memo reported by The Information and The Wall Street Journal on Monday.
The directive marks a significant strategic shift for OpenAI, which will delay several planned initiatives, including advertising experiments, AI-powered shopping tools, and a personal assistant called Pulse.
Instead, the company will marshal more resources toward enhancing ChatGPT's core functionality and user experience.
The move comes in direct response to Google's successful launch of its Gemini 3 AI model on November 18, which now sits at the top of benchmark leaderboards for tasks including text generation, image editing, and image processing.
The model debuted ahead of rivals like ChatGPT, xAI's Grok, and Anthropic's Claude in multiple categories.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Altman urged staffers to work on ChatGPT's "day-to-day experience," including improvements to personalization features, faster and more reliable responses, and the ability to answer a wider range of questions.
Thomas Wolf, co-founder and chief scientific officer of AI platform Hugging Face, told the Financial Times that the competitive landscape has transformed dramatically.
"The world today is profoundly different from the situation two years ago, when OpenAI was ahead of everyone else," Wolf said.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff wrote on X that he is not returning to ChatGPT after trying Google's new model, stating the improvements in reasoning, speed, images, and video capabilities represent a significant leap forward.
While OpenAI has not publicly confirmed plans to sell advertisements, the company is testing various ad formats, including those related to online shopping, according to a person with knowledge of its plans who spoke to The Information.
The company will postpone these advertising tests as part of the code red initiative.
OpenAI has brought in Fidji Simo as CEO of Applications, who previously played a major role in bringing ads to Facebook's app during her decade-long tenure at Meta. According to reports, approximately 630 of OpenAI's 3,000 employees previously worked at Meta.
Sam Altman has expressed mixed feelings about advertising in past interviews.
On the Lex Fridman Podcast, Altman said he "kind of hates ads just as an aesthetic choice," adding that he preferred a paid model where "users know that advertisers do not influence the answers they're getting."
However, in another interview earlier this year, Altman acknowledged that ads can be effective when done well, saying, "I'm not totally against it. I think ads on Instagram are kind of cool—I've bought a bunch of stuff from them. But it would take a lot of care to get right."
Battle for AI dominance intensifies
Nick Turley, OpenAI's head of ChatGPT, addressed the company's renewed focus in a post on X about the chatbot's third anniversary, writing that the company's focus is "to keep making ChatGPT more capable, continue growing, and expand access around the world — while making it feel even more intuitive and personal."
ChatGPT now has over 800 million weekly active users, according to OpenAI, while Google's Gemini app has reached 650 million monthly active users.
Google also reported that over one million users tried Gemini 3 in its first 24 hours through both the company's AI coding program and integration tools.
The competition extends beyond Google, with OpenAI also facing pressure from competitors, including Anthropic and Chinese firm DeepSeek, which have launched new models aimed at the same enterprise and consumer AI markets.
Industry analysis suggests these newer systems now match or surpass OpenAI on some standardized benchmarks.
Despite its massive user base, OpenAI is not yet profitable and continues to raise funding regularly. The company's valuation is estimated at around $500 billion, according to reports.
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