OpenAI has recently acquired a startup that specializes in slide decks. It is building an office suite through a series of acqui-hires.
OpenAI has obtained NextSlide, a startup that transformed prompts, notes, documents, and research into complete editable presentations. The financial details were not revealed, and the team has since joined ChatGPT. Founder Ahmed Beshry announced the acquisition in a message on the company’s website, which now features no other content. “The NextSlide team is now at OpenAI, contributing to the development of ChatGPT,” he stated.
A brief journey to exit
NextSlide was established in mid-2025, making it nearly a year old at the time of its exit. This speedy trajectory is notable even by current benchmarks, reflecting more on OpenAI’s desire than on the product itself.
This marks Beshry’s second exit. He co-founded Caper AI, a smart cart and cashierless checkout service, which was acquired by Instacart in October 2021, with carts already operating in Kroger, Wakefern, and Sobeys stores.
The acquisition trend
This is not a standalone acquisition. OpenAI spent $6.5 billion on io, Jony Ive’s hardware company, and $1.1 billion on analytics firm Statsig, while also subtly integrating smaller teams, including personal finance apps Hiro and Roi.
The pattern is clear: a compact team, a functional product, and a place within ChatGPT rather than an enduring brand. Most of these acquisitions are primarily aimed at recruitment with a product included.
What OpenAI is actually developing
The inclusion of presentations is not a random choice. Documents, canvas, file management, and now slide decks are essential components of an office suite, and OpenAI has been gradually piecing them together.
ChatGPT Work represents the clearest demonstration of intent, functioning as an agent that operates across a user’s applications and files, remaining engaged with a project for extended periods rather than just responding to isolated queries.
The momentum is genuine. OpenAI’s agents have surpassed 10 million users as the company seeks to transform a consumer behavior into software that finance, sales, and operations teams will pay to maintain.
The conflict of interest
The product that NextSlide intended to replace is PowerPoint. Microsoft is OpenAI’s largest investor and has integrated OpenAI’s technology into Office, Windows, and Bing, making every advancement into productivity software a step onto the turf of its investor.
Regulatory bodies have already taken notice of this relationship. The EU has joined the UK in examining the OpenAI-Microsoft partnership, which presents a more complex issue when a partner also competes directly in your core market compared to one that simply provides funding.
The competitive landscape
Google is pursuing a similar strategy from its own angle. Gemini Spark debuted at I/O as a continuous assistant facilitating tasks through Gmail, integrating Google’s existing offerings rather than acquiring new ones.
The structural distinction lies in that Google already possesses the productivity tools and is enhancing them with intelligence, while OpenAI owns the intelligence and is acquiring the tools.
The success of each approach may hinge on whether users prefer AI to be integrated into the tools they already utilize or to have those tools replaced with AI-centered solutions from the outset. NextSlide represents a small wager on the latter scenario.
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OpenAI has recently acquired a startup that specializes in slide decks. It is building an office suite through a series of acqui-hires.
OpenAI has purchased the presentation startup NextSlide after approximately a year of existence. The product it is replacing is PowerPoint, which is owned by its largest investor.