Business & Economics
OpenAI CEO Admits Semi-Annual “Code Red” Emergencies as Google’s Gemini 3 Pressures ChatGPT
In a 19-20 Dec 2025 podcast blitz, Sam Altman revealed OpenAI has already entered emergency “code red” mode several times this year—halting side projects for 6-8-week sprints to harden ChatGPT after Google’s Gemini 3 and other rivals—and expects to repeat the drill one to two times every year.
Focusing Facts
- The current Dec 2025 code red froze advertising, AI-agent and e-commerce work for eight weeks to accelerate GPT-5.2 and a new image model.
- A prior code red in early 2025 was triggered when China’s DeepSeek topped OpenAI’s o3 benchmarks, exposing strategy gaps.
- Altman warned that if Google had “taken us seriously” in 2023, it “could have smashed us,” underscoring Gemini 3’s ongoing threat despite modest metric impact.
Context
Altman’s admission echoes IBM’s 1964 ‘Operation Catch-Up’ scramble after CDC’s 6600 outgunned Big Blue: incumbents can still panic when a challenger redraws performance charts. The pattern fits a longer arc—tech platforms now iterate at pandemic-era cadence, treating competitive releases like biohazards requiring lockdown-style responses. Semi-annual code reds institutionalise paranoia as a management tool, suggesting the AI sector is converging on arms-race dynamics where speed, scale of compute spend, and user lock-in trump pure research ideals. Over a century horizon, such routinised crisis cycles hint at a maturing general-purpose technology similar to electrification (1880s-1920s): early wild-west fragmentation yields to a few capital-intensive giants whose survival hinges on relentless optimisation and access to public markets—making Altman’s reluctant IPO stance less a choice than an inevitability if OpenAI hopes to avoid the fate of once-innovative firms that ran out of cash during standardisation waves (think RCA in the 1970s).
Perspectives
US tech-business outlets
Windows Central, Fortune, PC Gamer — Frame OpenAI’s recurring “code red” drills as savvy, even admirable paranoia that keeps the company innovating and fending off Google’s Gemini threat. By celebrating the hustle narrative and model launches, these ad-supported publications benefit from stoking excitement and may gloss over ethical or regulatory downsides that could dampen readership engagement.
Indian financial-tech press
The Times of India, ETCIO, Mint, The Indian Express — Highlight Altman’s ‘0 % excited’ quip while stressing that a gargantuan IPO is ultimately inevitable so OpenAI can raise the billions it needs to win the AI race. Focusing on eye-catching valuations and listing timelines appeals to investor-minded readers and can overstate certainty around an IPO that Altman himself hedges on, amplifying speculation to drive traffic.
Public radio / civic-minded media
KUOW-FM — Centers the conversation on long-term AI safety and disaster scenarios, with Altman arguing benefits will outweigh existential risks. By prioritizing ethical debate over market competition, this outlet risks under-reporting commercial stakes that influence how safety promises are actually funded and enforced. ( KUOW-FM (94.9, Seattle) )