OpenAI pursued Cursor maker before entering into talks to buy Windsurf for $3B

OpenAI’s Acquisition Strategy: Why Windsurf Over Anysphere?

When news broke that OpenAI was in talks to acquire AI coding company Windsurf for $3 billion, one of the first questions on the mind of anyone following the space was likely: “Why not buy Cursor creator Anysphere instead?”

After all, OpenAI Startup Fund has been an investor in Anysphere, the maker of Cursor, since the quickly-growing coding assistant’s seed round in late 2023. It turns out that OpenAI indeed approached Anysphere in 2024 and again earlier this year about a potential acquisition, according to a report from CNBC. The talks failed. Instead, Anysphere has been in talks to raise capital at about $10 billion valuation, Bloomberg reported last month.

OpenAI’s desire to move on to acquisition discussions with another coding assistant maker signals how important capturing a slice of the code generation market has become for the ChatGPT maker. Windsurf is generating about $40 million in annualized recurring revenue (ARR), JS reported in February. Meanwhile, Anysphere’s Cursor reportedly makes about $200 million on an ARR basis.

While OpenAI’s Codex CLI “agent,” which the company released Wednesday, can also write and edit code, its attempt to buy Windsurf suggests the company doesn’t want to wait for CLI to gain traction with customers.