On Wednesday, OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, shared a URL on X (formerly Twitter): chat.com. When visited, the link now directs users to ChatGPT, OpenAI’s widely used AI platform.
Chat.com previously belonged to Dharmesh Shah, the founder and Chief Technology Officer of HubSpot. Shah purchased the domain early in 2023 for a hefty $15.5 million. Only a few months later, he announced that he had sold it, but he remained tight-lipped about who bought it or how much they paid. However, Shah did confirm that the sale price was higher than what he originally paid.
In a LinkedIn post following his purchase, Shah explained his reason for buying chat.com, stating that he believed the “Chat-based UX (#ChatUX)” would be the next big development in software. According to Shah, communicating with software through natural language is far more user-friendly, an idea made feasible by advancements in generative AI. After purchasing chat.com, he initially had it redirect to this LinkedIn post to outline his vision for its potential. Not long after, he sold the domain, and now chat.com is officially in OpenAI’s hands.
After the initial news broke, Shah confirmed on X that OpenAI was indeed the buyer. He also hinted that the transaction involved OpenAI paying him in company shares instead of cash, giving Shah a potential stake in one of the leading AI companies.
Dropping the “GPT” from the domain aligns with OpenAI’s recent efforts to simplify and refine its brand. In September, OpenAI introduced a new series of reasoning models with names starting with “o1.” At the time, Bob McGrew, the company’s former chief research officer, shared with The Verge that the goal was to initiate “newer, more intuitive names” for OpenAI’s products, allowing the company to communicate its work more effectively.
Investing in unique, memorable domain names is not a new trend in the tech world. Vanity domains, as they’re often called, have been a valuable commodity since the early days of the internet. Just recently, the AI startup Friend bought friend.com for $1.8 million after securing $2.5 million in funding. By comparison, OpenAI’s recent domain acquisition—whether paid in cash or shares—is a small expense, considering the $6.6 billion in funding it recently raised.