In a monumental channel move, OpenAI is launching its first-ever partner program: the OpenAI Partner Network. OpenAI channel leader Colleen Kapase explains to CRN everything solution providers need to know about the new program and OpenAI’s channel strategy.
In one of the most highly anticipated partner program launches in years, OpenAI is diving into the channel with the launch of the OpenAI Partner Network backed by $150 million in funding.
OpenAI’s inaugural partner program is a three-tier program with specializations, such as OpenAI Codex, that opens huge enterprise AI sales opportunities for skilled, AI-focused solution providers, OpenAI’s partner program leader Colleen Kapase tells CRN.
“This is a massive opportunity for any partner out there,” said Kapase, vice president of global strategic partners and ecosystem for OpenAI.
“I mean, we have 900 million weekly active users of OpenAI technology—900 million weekly—that’s amazing. Partners do not want to miss this opportunity,” she said. “We’re really showing here that we need these partners, we care about them, we’re co-investing with them, and we’re going to do some amazing things together.”
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Kapase said helping every organization adopt OpenAI frontier models and AI products and turn them into business outcomes requires an ecosystem of partners with deep industry expertise, global delivery capacity, and customer relationships—which is why OpenAI is coming out of the channel gate sprinting.
OpenAI’s Partner Network Details; $150 Million Fund And 300,000 OpenAI Consultants
The OpenAI Partner Network will officially kick off in July, with the company seeking partners who can build, sell and deliver AI solutions with OpenAI.
The San Francisco-based AI superstar is investing $150 million upfront to support its new partner ecosystem with the goal of training a whopping 300,000 certified OpenAI consultants by the end of 2026.
Partners can progress through the three-tiered partner program via sales performance, technical capability, co-selling engagements and deployment experience.
OpenAI is also piloting a Forward Deployed Experts partner program that will help its top partners better align with OpenAI’s own forward deployed engineering teams.
Kapase: OpenAI’s Channel Future ‘Is For Real’
Colleen Kapase is a longtime and well-known channel champion who led partner programs for some of the biggest channel players in the world, including Google Cloud, Snowflake, Citrix and VMware. Over her 25 years of top channel leadership, she’s formed tight relationships with some of the largest solution providers on the planet.
One thing she wants partners to know is that OpenAI “is for real” when it comes to investing and developing a global ecosystem of system integrators, AI MSPs, AI consultants and more.
“I’m here for the long haul. I’m here to create a world-class partner experience for these organizations, and I certainly don’t think this is the end of our investment in partners,” she said. “This is just the beginning.”
Kapase takes a deep dive with CRN into the new OpenAI Partner Network, specializations inside the program, what types of partners OpenAI is seeking and everything a solution provider needs to know about OpenAI’s channel future.
To start off, just break down the new OpenAI Partner Network. What are the tiers, specializations, etc. and what type of partners are you looking for?
We will have three tiers: Select, Advanced, and Elite.
There will be very highly technical, capable requirements here.
So we’re going to have co-sell requirements. How are you selling with us?
I want to put the word ‘selling’ in quotes, it’s really how are you strategizing with us and with customers of what is the right transformation journey for each client?
Definitely on the deployment side, there’ll be deployment criteria as well. That’s probably the biggest need we have. Deployment is the very most important thing.
Then there’s also an enablement path that we have. We’re going to have specializations for partners to earn, because what I’m seeing is just a product going in many different directions very fast.
We have a cyber specialization coming out new this year, a Codex specialization, which obviously is amazing; an API specialization; agent transformation specialization—ways for partners to pick a focus area and go deep.
In my past life this took a long time to get out, so the fact that we could come out here and hit the ground running with specializations right away just shows how fast the pace is moving here.
We are going live in July. I know partners are going to say, ‘What do I need to do? How do I need to engage?’ So we’re going live in July.
We’re looking for enterprise-ready partners that know how to do AI transformation.
What is OpenAI spending its new $150 million channel investment in?
That’s going to be used for enablement, for service delivery, cost offsetting, for MDF funds, etc.
There’s an alignment across our entire leadership that: partners are important, we need them, and the $150 million is a signal to our partners of our investment in them.
This is an important moment for us, frankly.
I’m excited and proud of how valuable we see these partners, and how important we know it is to invest in them.
I think we’re really showing that we need these partners, we care about them, we’re co-investing with them, and we’re going to do some amazing things together.
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How many partners does OpenAI hope to have in the program by the end of 2026?
We’re looking to certify 300,000 individuals by the end of the year.
But in terms of number of partners, I really want to say this is a quality versus quantity game.
We are really looking for the capability of these partners who are AI focused.
I mean, we’re having major GPT releases come out five times faster—they’re coming out every six weeks.
In terms of our enablement strategy: gone are the old days where you can certify on the technology in January and sell it throughout the rest of the year, and expect that technology not to change.
With new releases coming every six weeks, with new solutions coming on like cybersecurity—we need partners that have the pace similar to OpenAI, which is moving very fast and enabling on a continuous basis, and being able to really again drive that transformational mindset.
We’re not looking for quantity, we’re looking for quality with a high bar, AI-focused, transformational oriented, and able to keep up with the pace of OpenAI on how things are evolving and changing quickly. And really dedicating experts to living and breathing this every single day.
How will partners be tiered in the program? Will tiering be based on sales volume, or number of specializations achieved, or successful customer outcomes, etc.? How can a partner move up the program ladder?
Partners need to get in there and earn one of those specializations. So that’s the first criteria to move up the ladder.
Then we will have co-sell requirements and how many opportunities are we engaged in and we’re selling together.
Then deployment criteria in terms of: how many service delivery projects have you done?
Over time, we’re probably going to get to the point of customer satisfaction data too.
One of the most amazing things about OpenAI is our ability to shift systems so quickly to really meet what we see is our customers’ needs or our needs and support our partner program.
But the message definitely is that there’s a high technical bar for partners to go through from a training perspective, because our customers really want the best.
OpenAI is piloting a Forward Deployed Experts partner program. Is this for like top-tier Elite partners?
This is going to be our highest-level training for our partners on-site here at headquarters, led by our own FDE-capable employees. So yes, that’ll be part of the requirement for Elite.
We’re going to build out a bench of partners with FDE to accelerate deployments. We want them to operate as an extension of our team.
Partners will gain exposure to OpenAI technologies, playbooks, and transformation patterns, helping them bring more OpenAI-native expertise into customer environments.
These certifications will include passing like a real-world case studies that are demonstrating the ability to generate outcomes for customers.
So that is our blue-chip experience from an individual perspective, if you will, forward deployed experts with the highest level of certification that we bring out there.
And it is both understanding our technology and understanding how our FTEs work to transform customers’ thinking of their genetic experience.
We’re being clear that this is a set of world-class industry leading partners that we’re bringing together with blue chip experience.
I’m pretty excited about it because there is a need for having AI transformation, forward-deployed experts at our customers. So I’m asking our partners to step up and invest.
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Talk about OpenAI Codex partner specialization opportunity.
The metrics are out there of Codex users increasing from 2 million to 5 million.
I mean 900 million weekly active users of OpenAI technology—900 million weekly—that’s amazing.
Partners do not want to miss this opportunity, but they need to invest, they need to think differently, they need to have a high technical bar, and they need to have a high industry customer meaning of processes.
We’re encouraging all of the partners to use Codex across not just their knowledge workers, but their developers and look at their experiences of how can they bring AI intelligence within their own company.
What is your message to all the channel partners you’ve worked with throughout your distinguished channel career? What do they need to know about OpenAI’s channel partner strategy now and for the future?
This is a massive opportunity for any partner out there. You need to put the right sources that have an engineering mindset, from an AI perspective, and build out focus and build out an OpenAI practice—because the opportunity is real.
I see this for data partners coming in droves.
Those are great customers that are ready for AI transformation. So any partner that is a data-focused partner, this is an amazing opportunity.
There’s opportunities for partners that have business processing capabilities, they know what is right for transformation, but you have to have the mindset that you’re going to look at things differently.
One of the many things that makes OpenAI special is we do not settle with the standard. We do not settle with incremental change.
I think a lot of folks use the word transformation, but our experience with our customers is truly transformative. It really is changing the way that they’re looking at their employees, looking at their processes, and those are the partners that are going to thrive here and grow.
This is where the magic of being a partner and a trusted advisor is going to come together, but it’s going to take investment, it’s going to be thinking differently, and it’s going to be taking laser focus on AI.
