The message, shared internally and seen by CNBC, said the company is also getting ready to release “an updated Chat model” this week. 

ChatGPT now has more than 800 million people using it every week and competition is getting tougher. 

Google’s Gemini app passed 750 million monthly users at the end of last year, while Anthropic has gained ground, especially among software developers.

The pressure is being felt most in coding tools. In his note to staff, Altman said OpenAI’s own coding product, Codex, had grown by about 50% in just one week. 

Codex goes head-to-head with Anthropic’s Claude Code, which has seen fast uptake over the past year.

OpenAI released a new version of Codex, called GPT-5.3-Codex, last week. Altman described the recent momentum as “insane” and added: “This was a great week.”

The company’s push comes after a period of concern about slowing growth. In December, OpenAI shifted staff and resources to improve ChatGPT as competitors closed in, both in growth and other areas.

Since then, the focus has been on keeping users engaged while expanding paid and business services.

OpenAI is also moving ahead with plans to show adverts inside ChatGPT for some users in the United States. The company has said the ads will be clearly marked, appear at the bottom of responses and will not affect what the chatbot says.

Behind the scenes, Altman and finance chief Sarah Friar have been briefing investors on OpenAI’s performance as the company seeks to complete a large funding round. 

CNBC has reported that discussions involve several major technology firms and could be finalised in stages. The figures and structure are still under discussion and may change.

For now, the message to ChatGPT staff was that growth in usage is here again, new products are rolling out, and OpenAI believes it has regained momentum in a crowded market.

However, M&A deals originating from mid-market and early stage companies have changed little in decades, still driven by banker networks, static databases, and fragmented research workflows.

Buyers usually see only what is already on the market, while high-quality, off-market opportunities remain hidden. 

GrowthPal, co-founded by Maneesh Bhandari, Shalu Mitruka and Amaresh Shirsat, was built to change this dynamic.

Today, the company has closed a $2.6 million funding round to accelerate its AI-powered M&A copilot for deal sourcing and execution.

The round was led by Ideaspring Capital with participation from prominent angel investors globally.

The new capital will support product development and expand GrowthPal’s presence across the US and international markets as demand grows for faster, more programmatic approaches to inorganic growth.

The announcement comes as M&A teams face pressures to do more with less. Corporate development teams are leaner, timelines are compressed, and competition for quality assets is intensifying. 

While platforms like PitchBook, D&B, Datasite, and Tracxn have made company data more accessible, they largely stop at aggregation. GrowthPal addresses a different need by applying AI-driven reasoning to help teams identify which companies actually matter, based on strategic intent, sector context, and readiness to transact.

“M&A sourcing is where most time and effort is wasted, especially for smaller and mid-market deals,” said Maneesh Bhandari, co-founder and CEO of GrowthPal. 

“Teams spend weeks researching, filtering, and chasing opportunities that never go anywhere. We built GrowthPal to help buyers focus only on high-intent, high-fit targets and move from mandate to meaningful conversations far faster.”

GrowthPal’s platform acts as an intelligent M&A copilot. When a buyer defines a growth objective, like acquiring a specific capability or entering a new geography, the system translates that goal into a structured acquisition thesis. 

Its AI agents then scan an enriched database of more than four million technology companies using signals from public filings, web activity, hiring trends, funding history, and other indicators. 

The result is a short list of precision-fit, often off-market targets that align closely with the buyer’s mandate, rather than broad lists of loosely relevant companies.

The company was founded to address a structural gap in the market. While more than a million meaningful startups exist globally, fewer than one percent scale successfully, usually due to lack of timely exits or strategic partnerships. 

At the same time, many acquirers struggle to find the right targets efficiently, particularly for transactions under $70 million that fall below the focus of traditional investment banks. GrowthPal was created to connect these two sides by making deal sourcing proactive, discreet, and data-driven.

GrowthPal has already supported more than 42 completed M&A transactions and facilitated over 210 LOI-stage conversations across North America, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. 

Clients include large and mid-market enterprises, fast-growing startups, private equity-backed firms, and corporate development teams across sectors such as IT services, SaaS, fintech, and vertical software. In one case, a single client closed seven acquisitions within 18 months using the platform.

The M&A space is increasingly shaped by data abundance and decision scarcity. Teams have more information than ever, yet struggle to turn it into conviction. As acquisitions become a core growth lever for companies of all sizes, the ability to reason across signals, context, and intent is becoming a competitive advantage.

“GrowthPal is solving one of the most under-optimised parts of the M&A lifecycle,” said Naganand Doraswamy, managing partner at Ideaspring Capital. “By focusing on qualified deal discovery and using AI to compress timelines, the team is enabling a more systematic approach to inorganic growth that traditional tools cannot offer.”

Looking ahead, GrowthPal plans to extend its intelligence deeper into the transaction lifecycle, supporting valuation reasoning, deal structuring, and preparation for negotiations. 

The company’s long-term vision is to become the system of intelligence that helps teams make better M&A decisions earlier, with greater confidence and clarity, starting from discovery and extending through execution.

My journey spans from building an AI-driven learning platform with Utiva and enabling global hiring and engagement with Entrova, two organizations that together form the backbone of my vision to democratize access to tech opportunities across the continent.

Discovering the Gap and Defining My Mission

Growing up in Nigeria, I saw first-hand how brilliant young people often faced limited career outcomes. Universities produced graduates, yet many lacked the practical skills global employers demanded. Meanwhile, companies abroad sought talent but bypassed Africa due to regulatory, payment, and trust barriers.

This gap drove my resolve. I chose not just to mentor or coach but to build the infrastructure that could systematically bridge learning and opportunity.

It was this vision that led me to lead in Utiva’s technology infrastructure for gaining in-demand tech skills and later to build Entrova, which allows global companies to access top talents in Africa.

Leading Transformation at Utiva

At Utiva, I was entrusted with a bold challenge: to design and oversee the systems that would deliver modern, job-ready tech education to thousands of Africans.

I built and managed the entire learning infrastructure, ensuring that courses moved beyond static lectures to immersive, project-based learning. I coded, integrated, and scaled systems that allowed learners to track progress, submit projects, receive mentor feedback, use real-life case studies and capstone projects, and also access internship opportunities and job offers.

I grew and led cross-functional teams of engineers, product managers, and instructional designers, instituting best practices like version control, CI/CD pipelines, peer reviews, and agile workflows. These processes transformed Utiva into a tech-driven, scalable learning hub, with global recognition and awards for its excellence.

The results were profound. Utiva empowered more than 200,000 tech talents to acquire relevant skills, and the apprenticeship program we designed helped over 90,000 learners transition into full-time roles. We expanded to over 19 countries, including the United Kingdom and the United States. Our paid cohorts grew steadily, with completion and placement rates soaring to 96%, and monthly engagements surpassing 20,000.

As Eyitayo Ogunmola, Utiva’s founder, often emphasizes, “Schools fail many graduates, but the world demands relevance.” My contribution ensured that relevance was no longer elusive but embedded into the core of Utiva’s learning model.

Scaling the Vision with Entrova

Yet I knew the work was only half done. After training came the real hurdle, securing global roles. Too many graduates faced roadblocks: contracts, compliance, payroll systems, and the perception gap between African talent and global employers.

Entrova was created to close that final gap. At Entrova, I lead technology architecture, ensuring the platform handles end-to-end talent operations: AI-driven talent matching, onboarding, compliance, cross-border payroll, and performance insights.

This is not a job board, it is an operating system for global collaboration. Through Entrova, companies in New York or Berlin can seamlessly hire, pay, and manage developers in Lagos, Accra, or Nairobi.

Utiva’s graduates now flow directly into these opportunities, making the pathway from learning to earning tangible.

By connecting the two platforms, Utiva as the pipeline and Entrova as the gateway, I am constructing a unified ecosystem that powers Africa’s global talent relevance.

Web Summit Qatar 2025 and MENA Partnerships

In February 2025, I also joined Web Summit Qatar, representing Entrova and sharing our vision for global collaboration and expanding opportunities for African talent across the MENA region.

Web Summit Qatar 2025 set high records of over 25,747 attendees from 124 countries, 1,520 startups, and 723 investors gathered in Doha.

At the summit, I explored partnerships for Entrova in the MENA region and deepened our presence among global investors and innovators.

This opportunity aligned perfectly with our mission: to ensure that African tech talent is not only trained but also visible and engaged in the world’s fast-growing innovation ecosystems. Also, we’ve continued working on partnerships with companies in the UK and the USA.

The Market Potential and Urgency

Today the data backs this vision and underscores the urgency of the work I am doing. By 2030, more than 230 million jobs in Sub-Saharan Africa will require some level of digital skills, creating roughly 650 million training opportunities and a multi-billion dollar skilling market across the region, according IFC Report.

Internet penetration and cloud capacity are expanding rapidly, making remote hiring and distributed workforces viable at scale.

Major infrastructure investments are already underway to support that growth, according African Union Digital Transformation Strategy.

Venture funding and startup activity have surged, showing both investor confidence and rising demand for talent to build and operate new products.

Global recruiters are now looking to Africa as a strategic source of developers and digital professionals

Together, these trends suggest that by 2030, Africa will not only supply millions of digitally enabled roles but also host an expanding services economy where platforms that link learning to compliant global hiring will unlock disproportionate value.

Voices in the Ecosystem

The importance of this mission is echoed by respected leaders in Africa’s tech ecosystem.

Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, co-founder of Andela and Flutterwave, once remarked: “The vision is huge, but it is very difficult to find mission-driven talent that has the courage and competence to execute against the vision.” His words capture the precise challenge that drives my work, turning ambition into competence and competence into opportunity.

Similarly, Eyitayo Ogunmola reminds us: “The greatest factor to success is knowing what others do not know.” That philosophy underpins my approach, building systems and solving frictions that others often overlook.

Industry analysts agree. A BusinessDay feature noted: “By investing in African talent, you are not just hiring workers, you are tapping into a wellspring of innovation, creativity, and determination.” This is the future I am determined to accelerate.

The Impact So Far

• Thousands of Africans now graduate with real project experience, mentorship, and globally relevant skills.
• Global firms have begun to see Africa as a strategic source of skilled talent rather than an afterthought.
• Compliance, payroll, and onboarding hurdles that once excluded African professionals are now being solved.
• Learning and work are no longer disconnected stages but part of one continuous, integrated journey.

Through Utiva and Entrova, I have helped rewrite the narrative: Africa’s tech professionals are not waiting to be discovered, they are ready to deliver.

Looking Ahead

The road ahead is ambitious. My goal is to expand Entrova’s reach across 50+ countries, reduce onboarding times for global companies from weeks to hours, and place tens of thousands of African talents into roles that shape the future of technology.

Challenges remain, quality assurance at scale, regulatory complexity, and global competition, but these are the very challenges that make the mission vital. I am committed to ensuring Africa’s voice in the global tech workforce is not marginal but central.

Conclusion

This is more than my career. It is my calling. I am building systems that outlive me, systems that ensure that Africa’s brightest minds can compete and collaborate globally without borders. From Utiva’s classrooms to Entrova’s cross-border engagements, I am shaping an ecosystem where learning becomes earning, and potential becomes impact.

The story is still being written, but the vision is clear: Africa’s talent is not the future, it is the present. And my role is to make sure the world knows it.

I smiled, but inwardly, I winced.

It wasn’t the confidence that bothered me, it was the maths. The kind of maths that turns startup founders into debtors. Because behind every vanity metric is a hard truth. And here’s one that’s difficult to ignore:

90% of startups fail.

Nearly half collapse because they misread market demand. Not because they didn’t dream big. Not because their logo wasn’t trendy. But because they didn’t understand what the numbers were really saying.

At a stage where global venture funding dropped to $66.5 billion in Q3 2024, the lowest in three years, investors are buying proof, not dreams and visions. And if your startup can’t show that it earns more than it spends, you’re not in the game. You’re in a countdown.

Welcome to the end of “burn and brag.” Welcome to the new economy: earn, or exit.

Understanding the Core: What Unit Economics Actually Means

Let’s not get tangled in complex languages. Unit economics is just a way of asking two questions:

1. How much does it cost you to get one customer?
   (That’s Customer Acquisition Cost — CAC)
2. How much money will that customer bring you over their lifetime?
   (That’s Lifetime Value — LTV)

If your CAC is ₦15,000 and your LTV is ₦10,000, then congratulations, you’re spending ₦5,000 to lose a customer. Multiply that by 1,000 users and you’re running a charity, not a business.

Many Nigerian startups are walking this road. High marketing costs, weak retention, and poor product-market fit stretch CAC to breaking point. Meanwhile, LTV is crushed by churn, pricing issues, or over-reliance on freemium models that never convert.

Startups that fail to balance CAC and LTV almost always struggle with long-term profitability. And in this funding space, that’s beyond a delay; we can call it a death sentence.

The Collapse of “Grow Now, Monetise Later”

This model worked… once. A few years ago, if you showed rapid user growth, VCs would line up to invest. Profits? Not urgent. Just promise them a hockey stick graph and expansion plans into six African countries.

But the tide has turned.

Global venture capitalists are careful.
Investors are tired of exits that never come.
Unicorns are being questioned.

There are 1,565 unicorns globally. Many of them are now being pressured by investors to justify their lofty valuations. Some are laying off staff. Others are “restructuring”, a polite word for panic.

We’ve also seen this locally. Think about 54gene. It raised millions, expanded fast, then imploded. Why? Not just market challenges. They scaled before they nailed their business model.

And as Sequoia Capital said, “The market isn’t rewarding growth at all costs like it did in years past.”

“Companies who move the quickest have the most runway and are most likely to avoid the death spiral.”

“Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.”

How to Fix Your Unit Economics Before it Kills Your Startup

The transition to solid economics is painful, yes. But it’s necessary. Here’s how founders can stop losing it:

1. Lower Your CAC, or Die Trying

Stop throwing money at ads that don’t convert. Referral systems, partnerships, community-led growth; these are more efficient. Know what works. Kill what doesn’t.

2. Increase LTV by Solving Actual Problems

If customers drop off after one month, your product has no stickiness. Improve value. Add retention features. Make people need you, not just try you.

3. Watch Your Margins Like a Hawk

What does it really cost you to deliver the product? If your margins are thin, scale makes it worse, not better.

4. Track Payback Period Relentlessly

How fast do you recover CAC? If it takes two years, you’re burning runway on wishful thinking.

5. Kill the Ego Metrics

Downloads, followers, media features; none of these pay salaries. Focus on revenue, retention, and repeatability.

We can’t keep building business models that need ₦1 billion in marketing to make ₦500 million in revenue.

Scale is a Privilege, Not a Right

Scaling isn’t a goal. It’s a reward for getting the fundamentals right.

A product that works in Yaba won’t magically work in Nairobi or Accra. Not if you’ve skipped the hard work of validating value. When you scale a broken business model, you scale the loss. Ask any founder who expanded too soon.

Y Combinator once warned, 

“Make something people want.”

“Stay lean and iterate fast.”

“Survival is the first priority.”

What Investors are Really Looking for Now

Startups that survive the next phase will be the ones who stop performing for investors and start performing for customers.

Investors today want:

• Positive contribution margins
• Clear LTV > CAC ratios
• 18 to 24 months of runway
• Evidence of product-market fit before scale

And here’s the irony: Only 18% of first-time founders succeed. Those with one failed company under their belt? 20% success rate. Failure educates. But why not skip the tuition fees by learning what matters now?

The Future is More Focused

The focus on unit economics is not the end of ambition. It’s the start of maturity. Investors are not rejecting innovation, it’s the waste they are rejecting.

We’re moving towards a startup ecosystem that prioritises fundamentals over fireworks. I welcome it.

If you’re a founder, it’s time to stop asking, “How do I raise my next round?”
Start asking, “How do I make this business make sense, without burning everything?”

Because in this new normal, burning money is not commended, it can be reckless. Profitability is not old-fashioned; it’s the future.

And for startups in Nigeria, where capital is scarce and unpredictability is plenty, understanding and acting on your unit economics is indispensable, not optional.