Key Points:
- OpenAI is acquiring Astral to enhance its AI coding assistant, Codex.
- Astral’s team will join OpenAI, bringing their expertise in developer tools.
- Codex currently boasts over 2 million weekly active users, tripling its growth this year.
- This acquisition is part of OpenAI’s broader strategy of buying companies to gain a competitive edge.
OpenAI announced Thursday that it’s buying Astral, a small company known for its open-source tools for software developers. The Astral team will join OpenAI to help improve Codex, OpenAI’s artificial intelligence coding assistant. Neither company shared how much money was involved in the deal.
Charlie Marsh, Astral’s founder and CEO, wrote in a blog post that their main goal remains the same: “to make programming more productive. To build tools that radically change what it feels like to build software.” This aligns perfectly with OpenAI’s ambitions for its coding tools.
AI coding assistants have become incredibly popular in the past year. OpenAI has been working hard to attract users and compete with rivals like Anthropic and Cursor, who also offer exciting tools for developers. OpenAI shared on Thursday that Codex now has over 2 million active users every week, and its user base has tripled since the beginning of the year.
This acquisition of Astral still needs to meet the usual closing conditions, including getting approval from regulators. OpenAI has been busy with acquisitions lately, showing its strategy to grow and stay ahead in the fast-moving AI world.
OpenAI has made several recent purchases. For example, in May 2025, they completed a massive $6.4 billion deal for Jony Ive’s AI devices startup io. Earlier this month, they announced plans to buy the cybersecurity startup Promptfoo, and they picked up the health-care technology startup Torch in January.
In December, OpenAI brought in Albert Lee from Google to lead its corporate development. This move signals that the company will keep looking for more companies to buy, aiming to give it an advantage in the competitive AI landscape.
