Microsoft Comes Out of OpenAI Deal a Winner; Risks in AI Financing

Microsoft and OpenAI had big news this morning but before we dive into that, it's fair to say there’s a lot of excitement among investors (and reporters!) about the upcoming SpaceX IPO. But some people have a refreshingly realistic assessment of the situation. “There’s a trillion ways this can go wrong,” said Ashley MacNeill, co-head of capital markets at investment firm Vista Equity Partners, at The Information’s Financing the AI Revolution event in New York on Monday. “There’s only a handful of ways this goes right.”

MacNeill was making the point that the unprecedented nature of the IPO—SpaceX wants to raise $75 billion, roughly the total raised by all U.S. IPOs last year, according to Dealogic—is an issue in itself. “Most of the IPO market, most of the things you see are based on precedents, based on things that have happened before,” she said. “It’s not so often that you get things that haven’t been done before.…I think there’s a ton of ways that this can go awry.” For more on the event, see here.