How OpenAI uses complex and circular deals to fuel its multibillion-dollar rise

These kinds of deals were very much a la mode just prior to the .com crash. Companies would buy advertising, then the websites and ad agencies would buy their services and they'd spend it again on advertising. The end result is immense revenues without profits.

There’s one key difference in my opinion: pre-.com deals were buying revenue with equity and nothing else. It was growth for growth’s sake. All that scale delivered mostly nothing.

OpenAI applies the same strategy, but they’re using their equity to buy compute that is critical to improving their core technology. It’s circular, but more like a flywheel and less like a merry-go-round. I have some faith it could go another way.