OpenAI has issued an internal 'Code Red,' a strategic initiative to address concerns regarding the potential performance degradation of ChatGPT and escalating competition, particularly from Google's Gemini. This emergency measure prioritizes the comprehensive improvement of ChatGPT by reallocating company-wide resources and temporarily halting new product development efforts, including its nascent advertising business, AI agent projects, and the personalized newsletter service 'Pulse.'

The core methodology of this 'Code Red' focuses on several key areas for ChatGPT enhancement:

1. Hyper-personalization: A significant emphasis is placed on allowing users to finely tune ChatGPT's conversational style and response characteristics to individual preferences. This aims to cater to the diverse needs of its claimed 800 million weekly active users by enabling granular control over interactions.
2. Advanced Image Generation: Efforts are underway to substantially enhance the quality and capabilities of ChatGPT's image generation features.
3. Optimized Response Latency: Improving the speed of responses is a critical objective, directly impacting user experience and efficiency.
4. Enhanced Service Reliability: Ensuring the stability and robustness of the ChatGPT service is a primary focus, minimizing disruptions and improving overall user trust.
5. Deployment of a Novel Inference Model: OpenAI plans to release a new, sophisticated reasoning model in the near future. This model, internally assessed to outperform Google's Gemini 3, is designed to support advanced functionalities within ChatGPT, such as the 'Thinking Mode' for complex problem-solving and 'Deep Research' for comprehensive analytical tasks. Technically, this involves leveraging greater computational resources to generate more in-depth and nuanced outputs, implying improvements in the model's ability to perform multi-step reasoning and knowledge synthesis.

The imperative for this 'Code Red' stems from several critical factors:

• Intensified Competition: Google's Gemini has demonstrated rapid user growth, with monthly active users (MAU) increasing from 450 million in July to 650 million in October. Google's strategic integration of 'AI Mode' into its search engine and the release of advanced image generation models like 'Nano Banana Pro' further intensify competitive pressure.
• Perceived Growth Deceleration: While OpenAI has reported 800 million weekly active users, internal statements from OpenAI's Chief Financial Officer, Sara Prior, acknowledge that "some key metrics are not growing as fast as before," indicating a slowdown in the pace of growth for certain critical indicators.
• Future Financial Projections: OpenAI anticipates requiring an additional $100 billion in funding over the coming years to support technological development and infrastructure expansion. The company projects revenues of$10 billion in 2024, $20 billion in 2025, and$35 billion by 2027. A significant slowdown in user growth or engagement could jeopardize these ambitious fundraising and revenue targets.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman underscored that the primary objective is to elevate the "user's perceived ChatGPT experience" above mere "underlying model performance," signaling a product-centric approach to address the current challenges. This strategic pivot mirrors the 'Code Red' initiated by Google three years prior in response to ChatGPT's initial emergence, marking a reversal of roles in the AI competitive landscape.