OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar has declared 2026 as the year for "practical adoption" of artificial intelligence, signaling a strategic shift toward real-world integration of AI across industries. In a recent blog post, Friar emphasized the need to close the gap between what AI technology can do and how it’s actually being used by individuals, businesses, and governments. “The priority is closing the gap between what AI now makes possible and how people, companies, and countries are using it day to day,” she wrote. She highlighted key sectors like healthcare, scientific research, and enterprise as areas where advanced AI can deliver tangible improvements in outcomes. Evidence of early progress is already emerging. Data from Ramp shows that business spending on OpenAI’s models hit a record high in December, surpassing usage of rival models from Anthropic and Google. This indicates growing enterprise confidence in the company’s offerings. Despite this momentum, concerns remain about OpenAI’s financial sustainability. The company has committed to massive infrastructure investments, including roughly $1.4 trillion in data center and compute deals over the past year. Critics question whether revenue will keep pace with such spending. To address this, OpenAI is exploring new revenue streams. On Friday, the company announced it would begin testing advertising, a move that marks a shift from CEO Sam Altman’s previous stance—where ads were labeled a “last resort.” The change has been anticipated for months, especially as OpenAI seeks to diversify its income beyond API usage and enterprise licensing. Friar defended the company’s financial trajectory, noting that revenue has grown in lockstep with its expanding compute capacity. In 2023, OpenAI’s compute power stood at 0.2 gigawatts. By the end of 2024, it had risen to about 1.9 gigawatts. Over the same period, annualized revenue jumped from $2 billion to more than $20 billion. “This represents never-before-seen growth at such scale,” Friar wrote. She added that increased compute availability would have accelerated customer adoption and monetization even further. Still, skepticism persists. Tech blogger Paul Kedrosky responded critically to Friar’s post, quipping that it was “amusing reading from OpenAI CFO bragging that they are successfully selling dollars for $0.70 in huge volume”—a pointed critique of the company’s high spending relative to current returns. As OpenAI pushes toward broader practical adoption in 2026, the balance between rapid expansion and financial discipline will remain under intense scrutiny.