The reason for closing the video‑AI generator OpenAI Sora became clear and quite simple

Summary of events

Last week OpenAI unexpectedly discontinued support for its video generator Sora, thereby breaching a contract with Disney. The decision was confirmed by sources from *The Wall Street Journal* – the primary reason was simply a lack of resources.

Why resources were critical

1. High computational costs

Sora consumed enormous amounts of energy and computing power, with daily expenses estimated at about $1 million.

2. Restrictions on the first phase

To manage the load, OpenAI limited video duration to 10 seconds. This helped keep infrastructure under control but did not allow rapid monetization of the service.

3. User base and resource competition

Initially Sora attracted around 1 million users; now that number has dropped to 500,000. Each user consumed significant computational resources that could have been needed by other OpenAI projects.

4. Monitoring and resource allocation

The internal monitoring system allowed visibility into which accelerators were engaged in Sora’s operation. The development team received a large share of resources, raising concerns among leadership about insufficient capacity for priority tasks.

5. Lack of profitability

Revenue from Sora would have been minimal while costs remained high; thus the company saw no point in further investment.

Impact on partner Disney

Disney and OpenAI signed a $1 million capital agreement that allowed Sora users to employ characters from the studio. After announcing the cancellation, Disney’s leadership learned of the decision roughly an hour before it was published in the media – there was no warning for partners.

Currently Disney is negotiating with more than ten potential AI‑service providers and officially expresses gratitude to OpenAI for collaboration, though it is disappointed by the abandonment of Sora development.

Thus, the shutdown of the Sora project resulted from a shortage of computational resources and an inability to quickly monetize the service, leading to a breach of the agreement with Disney.