OpenAI wants to own how software gets built. On Thursday it made a move.
It is buying a startup called Ona, all to build a smarter coding tool.
Codex is OpenAI's AI helper for writing code. Millions of coders now lean on tools like it.
Ona builds safe, ready-made cloud workspaces, which AI agents use to get real work done. An AI agent is software that finishes tasks on its own, with no person guiding each step.
Plug Ona into Codex and the tool can take on longer jobs. It can also run them from start to end.
Ona's tech also helps firms put AI agents to work for real, not just in tests. OpenAI did not say what it is paying, and Ona's team will join the Codex group once the deal closes.
Ona's boss sounded thrilled. He said selling the company felt less like an ending and more like the work getting bigger.
The Codex team will soon be bigger, thanks to Ona's staff.
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OpenAI is chasing a fast rival, Anthropic, which makes a hit tool called Claude Code. Buying a finished team is faster than building one from scratch.
It is like hiring people who already know the job. The plan seems to be working, with Codex now topping 5 million weekly users, up from 3 million in April.
This is also part of a buying spree. It bought a security startup, Promptfoo, in March. It picked up a health-tech firm, Torch, in January.
Last year it paid more than $6 billion for Jony Ive's hardware company. The shopping is not slowing down.
OpenAI kicked off the AI boom with ChatGPT back in 2022. Since then it has grown into one of tech's most watched firms.
There is a money angle here too. OpenAI filed to go public on Monday, and Anthropic filed its own just days before.
The whole field is racing to the stock market at once. Elon Musk's SpaceX joins them Friday, in what could be the biggest stock debut ever.
SpaceX even merged with Musk's own AI startup, xAI, earlier this year. So the lines between these AI giants keep blurring.
The bet is simple: buying talent keeps OpenAI ahead of its rival. Whether that lead holds is the real fight.
Anthropic does not share its own user count, but it has grown fast over the past year. Coding tools are now a key fight in AI.
Both firms want to be the top helper for the world's coders. For now, the two trade punches deal by deal.
The next round of user numbers will show who is pulling away.
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