OpenAI eyes Israel expansion, hires Amazon executive and weighs business hub

OpenAI is exploring an expansion into Israel, according to a report by Israeli publication Calcalist published by Ynetnews. The move would initially focus on business development rather than establishing a research and development center, aiming to build ties with the country's vibrant tech sector.

A senior Israeli Amazon executive who until recently led AWS for Startups in Israel has been recruited by OpenAI and has begun working at the company. He will be responsible for the EMEA region — covering Europe, the Middle East and Africa — and report to a manager in London, though he is expected to focus primarily on Israel.

OpenAI wants to build a presence in the Israeli ecosystem using a model similar to cloud companies: establishing relationships with local startups early on and growing revenue as those startups scale. The company is expected to hold a startup event in Israel with AWS toward the end of the month, where it will present its enterprise-market services.

Meanwhile, OpenAI's careers website lists an opening for an account manager serving Israel's tech sector. Although officially listed as Paris-based, the role is expected to work from Israel and report to OpenAI's European offices. Sources familiar with OpenAI's plans believe the company will later seek a senior executive to lead an Israeli sales office in a country manager role.

OpenAI currently operates only two R&D centers outside the United States: one in London (its largest) and another in Zurich. In contrast, Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Nvidia each employ thousands in their Israeli R&D centers. OpenAI's trajectory mirrors Google's early entry into Israel, which began with marketing and business operations before expanding into R&D.

The expansion follows a similar playbook to OpenAI's India entry about a year ago, where it hired for comparable positions and had an active office by end of 2025.

The Israel push comes as OpenAI faces intensifying competition from Anthropic and Google for enterprise customers and AI talent. Establishing a local beachhead in one of the world's most concentrated tech ecosystems could help narrow that gap.