Dali Rajic, OpenAI’s new chief revenue officer, takes on a role his predecessor held for less than a year, according to a Fortune profile published this week.
Denise Dresser departed the position after a brief tenure, leaving OpenAI searching for a steadier hand as it moves closer to the public markets.
Rajic, 53, is described by four former colleagues as disciplined, blunt, and intellectual. His task is to build commercial revenues that match the scale of OpenAI’s valuation.
Dali Rajic OpenAI revenue record: from AppDynamics to Cisco’s $3.7bn deal
Rajic joined AppDynamics to lead sales in 2012. The company came within reach of an IPO in March 2017 before Cisco stepped in and bought it for $3.7 billion, according to Fortune.
That near-miss with the public markets will inform his next assignment. OpenAI is widely expected to pursue a listing, and Rajic is seen as central to making that case to investors.
Born in Yugoslavia, in a region that is now Croatia, he moved to Germany at the age of one. He came to the United States at 16 to finish secondary school, he said on a 2022 episode of the Grit podcast. He then studied at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, before taking an MBA at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.
‘He is one of the most intense people you will ever meet,’ one former colleague told Fortune. ‘We would call him the Croatian Sensation. I remember we would get breakfast, and his version of breakfast was on our way to a meeting would grab two hard-boiled eggs at Starbucks, stuff them in his mouth, and be like, “That’s breakfast. Let’s go.”‘
Questions over whether Rajic can last at OpenAI
Whether he stays is an open question. ‘It’ll be interesting to see if Dali is there in 12 or 18 months, or if he will burn out like so many other people do at OpenAI,’ one source told Fortune.
Rajic declined to comment for the Fortune profile but confirmed the accuracy of the details it contained.
Meanwhile, the venture capital market produced a series of sizeable rounds this week. Alice, a New York City and Tel Aviv-based AI trust, safety and security platform, raised $140 million in a round led by Apax Digital Funds, joined by Samsung, SentinelOne and others.
Stability AI, the Los Angeles-based developer of AI products for creatives across music, gaming and entertainment, raised $76 million in Series B funding from Universal Music Group, Sony Music Group, AMD Ventures and others.
San Francisco-based AI search platform Liner raised $36.1 million in a Series C round led by LB Investment. Web-search infrastructure firm Keenable raised $26 million in seed funding led by Accel.
Corvus Robotics, a developer of physical AI robots for logistics and warehousing, and portfolio management platform Standard Metrics each raised $20 million in separate rounds.
On the exits side, Navitas Semiconductor agreed to acquire Claros, an AI data centre power delivery company, from Red Cell Partners and General Catalyst in a deal valued at up to $232.8 million.
Rajic confirmed the details in Fortune’s profile and is expected to feature prominently in OpenAI’s IPO preparations, with the public markets now a near-term consideration for the company.
