OpenAI is planning to establish a business development centre in Israel, Calcalist reported, with the ChatGPT maker recruiting a senior Israeli executive from Amazon.

An open position for an account manager covering Israeli high-tech clients also appeared on OpenAI's careers site, listed officially under Paris but intended for Israel-based staff. A country manager role is expected to follow, contingent on the pace of initial activity. The company is planning a startup event in the country later this month.

This move indicates OpenAI’s ambition to enter Israel’s burgeoning AI sector. Nvidia has recognised Israel’s AI potential, inaugurating a new R&D centre in southern Israel. Meanwhile, local Israeli players have been making strides in the AI market, including AI video generator Artlist and app-building platform Base44, which launched its own large language model.

OpenAI's entry into Israel signals the company’s new international expansion plan. In India, the company began recruiting for similar roles approximately a year ago and had an active office operational by the end of 2025. Development centres, where they exist, come later. OpenAI currently operates only two outside the United States, in London and Zurich.

Israel's appeal is grounded in usage data. According to figures from Anthropic, Israel ranks first globally in per capita use of Claude among the working population, ahead of the US and Singapore, a metric that underscores the depth of AI adoption across the country's corporate sector. OpenAI is looking to convert that adoption into direct commercial relationships with local startups, modelling its approach on cloud providers that embed themselves in ecosystems early and scale revenues as clients grow.

Towards the end of July, OpenAI is expected to hold a startup-focused event in Israel in collaboration with AWS, where its enterprise products will be presented. The initiative also reflects competitive pressure from Anthropic and Google, both of which have moved aggressively to capture enterprise AI spending in the Israeli market.