> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://notes.kodekloud.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # What is OpenAI > The article traces OpenAIs journey from its 2015 origins, covering milestones, platform components, and generative AI services. In this article, we’ll trace OpenAI’s journey from its 2015 origins through its major milestones and provide a high-level overview of the OpenAI platform—covering its foundation models, services, APIs, and developer tools. ## Evolution of OpenAI OpenAI began as a non-profit in December 2015 with a mission to ensure that artificial general intelligence (AGI) benefits all of humanity. Since then, it has evolved into a leading provider of generative AI services. | Year | Milestone | | -------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | **2015** | Founded by Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and others as a non-profit AI research lab. | | **2018** | Elon Musk resigned from the board, citing potential conflicts of interest. | | **2019** | Converted to a “capped” for-profit entity and secured a \$1 billion investment from Microsoft. | | **2020** | Launched GPT-3, its first large-scale language model, accessible via a hosted API. | | **2021** | Introduced DALL·E for text-to-image generation. | | **Late 2022** | Released ChatGPT, a conversational AI powered by GPT series models. | | **Early 2023** | Received an additional \$10 billion commitment from Microsoft and expanded availability on Azure. | ![The image is a timeline illustrating key events in the history of OpenAI from 2015 to 2023, including its founding, major investments, and the announcement of technologies like GPT-3, DALL-E, and ChatGPT.](https://kodekloud.com/kk-media/image/upload/v1752881536/notes-assets/images/Mastering-Generative-AI-with-OpenAI-What-is-OpenAI/openai-history-timeline-2015-2023.jpg) OpenAI’s shift from non-profit to for-profit aligned incentives for scaling infrastructure and delivering enterprise-grade AI services. ## High-Level View of the OpenAI Platform At its core, OpenAI provides generative AI as a service, enabling developers and organizations to integrate advanced models into applications. Below is a breakdown of the primary platform components: | Component | Purpose | Examples / Tools | | --------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------- | | **Foundation Models** | Pretrained, large-scale neural networks for language and vision tasks. | GPT-3, DALL·E, ChatGPT | | **Services Platform** | Handles API orchestration, model versioning, user authentication, and security. | Rate limiting, billing, fine-tuning pipelines | | **API Layer** | RESTful edge endpoints for easy integration into any environment. | `POST /v1/completions`, `POST /v1/images/generations` | | **Developer Tools** | SDKs, CLI, and code samples for rapid prototyping and deployment. | OpenAI Python SDK, Node.js client, examples on GitHub | Applications can call the OpenAI API directly or use the official SDKs to streamline authentication, manage requests, and process responses in your preferred language. ![The image is a flowchart titled "OpenAI – 10,000 Ft. Overview," showing the interaction between tools, libraries, an API, OpenAI, and foundation models.](https://kodekloud.com/kk-media/image/upload/v1752881537/notes-assets/images/Mastering-Generative-AI-with-OpenAI-What-is-OpenAI/openai-10000ft-overview-flowchart.jpg) ## Links and References * [OpenAI Official Site](https://openai.com/) * [GPT-3 Documentation](https://platform.openai.com/docs/models/gpt-3) * [DALL·E Overview](https://platform.openai.com/docs/models/dall-e) * [ChatGPT Blog Post](https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt) * [Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service](https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/cognitive-services/openai-service/) * [OpenAI Python SDK on GitHub](https://github.com/openai/openai-python)