Jake Paul was a firebrand YouTuber. Then he was an NFT merchant, and a betting site operator. Now, Paul is a professional boxer — and venture capitalist. And he’s learning from one of the biggest names in tech.
On “Sourcery,” Paul said that he met OpenAI CEO Sam Altman while sitting next to each other at President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
“Sam likes fast cars, and so do I,” Paul said. “So, we just started talking about cars, and then we got along, and that was really it.”
Paul’s Anti Fund — which is also led by his brother Logan and longtime founder Geoffrey Woo — invested in OpenAI in 2025. The biggest lesson he’s learned from Altman is efficiency, Paul said.
He described the quick-and-tidy meetings that Altman runs. The OpenAI CEO “walks into the room, sits down, let’s get right into the conversation, boom boom boom,” he said.
In 15 minutes alone, Altman was “hella productive,” Paul said. Then, Altman can go on to his next meeting and do it all over again.
“We’ll do hourlong meetings or calls and just waste time,” Paul said. “I think that was inspiring because time is the most valuable thing, and it’s the only reason you can’t accomplish more.”
Indeed, Altman has long opted for the 15-minute meeting. In a 2018 blog post, he wrote that the ideal meeting time is either around 15 to 20 minutes or 2 hours, but “the default of 1 hour is usually wrong.”
Paul has worked closely with OpenAI in the last year, beyond participating in fundraising.
Remember all of those strange Paul memes running around the internet during the Sora 2 launch? They were by design. Paul said he helped consult on the project and was one of the first to sign over his name, image, and likeness.
Woo also appeared on the podcast, and spelled out the thinking behind those far-out memes (such as an AI Paul declaring he was gay). “It was not something that was like, ‘Hey, Jake Paul is now gay.’ Jake was thoughtful in terms of why we were part of that launch.”
Woo also said that he had formed a good friendship with Altman and Mark Chen, OpenAI’s chief research officer.
For the Sora 2 launch, Paul said that he had “regular calls” with OpenAI and offered “super detailed consulting.”
“Me and my brother have however many years combined of social media experience since the beginning,” Paul said. “We were there when the term ‘influencer’ was even made up.”
This background, Paul said, helped him give good advice on what OpenAI’s social media-like interface should look like. He advised on both what creators and audiences wanted, he said.
Anti Fund closed its $30 million fund in September. Other investments include defense tech startup Anduril and prediction market Polymarket.
Woo said their ties to OpenAI remain strong. “We were just at OpenAI for three hours looking for other ways to collaborate,” he said. “Things might be cooking.”
