OpenAI Picks Up AI Presentation Creator NextSlide

The deal happened earlier this year but was announced Friday (Aug. 7) by Ahmed Beshry, NextSlide’s founder, on his LinkedIn page. NextSlide’s website also includes a message from Beshy on the deal, though no financial information has been released.

“We started NextSlide a little over a year ago with a simple belief: bringing an idea to life shouldn’t depend on your ability to design slides,” the message reads.

“We built a product that could turn prompts, notes, documents, or research into a polished, editable presentation — making it easier for anyone to share what they know. Our goal was never simply to generate slides faster. We wanted to make visual communication more accessible and help more people express their ideas clearly.”

Beshry added that he and his team are now “at OpenAI, helping build ChatGPT” and pursuing a mission of “building AI products that help people create, communicate, and turn their ideas into meaningful work.”

The acquisition news comes at a time of high AI adoption among white collar professionals, according to the May edition of “The Enterprise AI Benchmark Report” from PYMNTS Intelligence. 

It found that banks, insurers and other financial companies have reached high AI adoption in 27 of 75 tasks examined, meaning that at least half of surveyed firms use AI for that activity. 

“The results suggest that financial firms are scaling AI fastest where the rules are clear, the data can be checked, and the outcomes can be measured,” PYMNTS wrote last week.

The research shows that spending is set to keep rising, with 85% of financial services firms planning to increase their AI budgets in the next 12 months. Productivity and competitive positioning were each mentioned by 65% of firms as reasons for additional investment, while 55% cited risk reduction and compliance.

It’s an encouraging outlook, PYMNTS wrote, though the next stage will hinge on a better foundation, as 30% of financial services leaders named fragmented or poor-quality data as their largest obstacle to broader deployment.

“Most respondents also said they expect AI to support human judgment rather than replace it,” the report added. “That creates a practical path forward. Improve the information feeding existing systems, expand proven uses and keep people responsible for the decisions that carry the greatest consequences.”

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