Jefferies Keeps Microsoft’s $490 Price Target

Maintained a Buy rating and $490 price target

“We’re bullish on OpenAI’s hire of Denise Dresser, CEO of Slack, as an ideal CRO with the experience (14 yrs @ CRM) needed to scale its enterprise business.

Also, OpenAI published a report exploring AI use in its enterprise customers.

While still early, we expect OpenAI to make a significant enterprise push in 2026, unlocking a major tactical opportunity for MSFT (27% owner, rev-share, cloud & IP rights) and benefiting ORCL & CRWV w/ high OAI backlog exposure.

We’re bullish on OpenAI’s hire of Denise Dresser, former CEO of Slack, to be its new CRO.

With over 14 years at Salesforce and extensive experience leading enterprise initiatives, Denise brings the expertise and network needed to build and scale OpenAI’s enterprise motion.

OpenAI Enterprise Business Growing Faster Than Consumer!

In Nov., OpenAI CFO highlighted enterprise sales now at ~40% of revenue (up from 30% at the start of the year), implying faster growth than consumer.

OpenAI now has 1M+ business customers (broader than just ChatGPT for Enterprise, includes API consumption).

Notably, 7M ChatGPT for Work seats (+40% in prior 2 months vs Nov.), with Enterprise Seats up 9x yoy.

We expect OpenAI to lean into enterprise in 2026 & beyond, given strong traction.

MSFT remains a net beneficiary – 27% owner, revenue-share partner, CSP – despite competing SKUs (M365 Copilot, GitHub Copilot).

MSFT’s early lands and distribution (>430M paid M365 seats) should outweigh overlap.

ORCL & CRWV stand to benefit, with heavy backlog exposure to OpenAI, should benefit from OpenAI’s traction in enterprise.”

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