OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed that the company has entered "code red" mode multiple times in response to competitive threats and expects to do so again as the AI race intensifies. Speaking on the "Big Technology Podcast," Altman described the emergency state as a recurring necessity, not a one-time event. "It's good to be paranoid and act quickly when a potential competitive threat emerges," Altman said. "My guess is we'll be doing these once or maybe twice a year for a long time, and that's part of really just making sure that we win in our space." He cited two recent instances that triggered the code red response. The first came earlier this year when China’s DeepSeek announced a new AI model that matched the performance of OpenAI’s top-tier o1 model at a significantly lower cost, sending shockwaves through the industry. The second occurred just two weeks after Google launched its latest AI chatbot, Gemini 3, which was released in November and quickly earned praise for its advanced capabilities. In an internal Slack message, Altman instructed staff to prioritize ChatGPT development and delay other product plans, signaling a full-scale response. While he noted that Gemini 3 did not have the immediate impact he initially feared, he acknowledged it still exposed gaps in OpenAI’s product strategy. "Still, it did — in the same way that Deepseek did — identify some weaknesses in our product offering strategy, and we're addressing those very quickly," Altman said. Since going code red, OpenAI has accelerated its rollout of new features. Last week, the company released a more powerful AI model designed to enhance performance in professional work, coding, and scientific research. It also introduced a new image-generation model earlier this week, further expanding its toolset. Altman said the code red phase is typically short-lived. "Historically, these have been kind of like six- or eight-week things for us," he added, suggesting the current emergency mode will not last indefinitely. The code red designation is not unique to OpenAI. In 2022, Google declared a similar internal emergency after the public debut of ChatGPT, which revealed the search giant’s lag in consumer-facing AI despite its foundational role in AI research. The move marked a turning point in Google’s AI strategy, leading to a major push in the space.