OpenAI has announced plans to acquire Ona, a cloud execution and orchestration company, as it looks to expand the capabilities of its Codex platform and support more advanced, long-running artificial intelligence (AI) workloads.
The acquisition, which is subject to regulatory approvals, will bring Ona’s technology into OpenAI’s systems, enabling AI agents to operate in secure, persistent cloud environments instead of being limited to a single session or device.
The move comes as Codex usage grows rapidly. OpenAI said more than 5 million people now use the platform weekly, up 400% since earlier this year, for tasks such as coding, research and workflow automation.
As these use cases become more complex, tasks increasingly run over longer periods. OpenAI said Ona’s technology allows such work to continue in the background, even when users are offline, by providing agents with access to tools, data and systems over time.
Ona has previously supported around 2 million developers with cloud-based development environments, according to the company. Its model allows organisations to run workloads within their own cloud infrastructure, maintaining control over data, access and compliance requirements.
OpenAI said this will help enterprises move from experimenting with AI tools to deploying them in production environments, where security and governance are critical.
The companies will continue to operate independently until the deal closes. Once completed, Ona’s team is expected to join OpenAI and work on scaling Codex for enterprise use.
