Lemkin: Selling 5% Equity to Corporate Partners Creates Disproportionate Alignment
Jason Lemkin · Enterprises Fear Frontier Models | Sam Altman Offers Trump 5% of OpenAI | DeepSeek Builds Own Chips · 20VC with Harry Stebbings · Jul 9, 2026 · at 7:53
Jason Lemkin is a SaaS investor and founder of SaaStr. He is explaining why Sam Altman's proposal for OpenAI to offer 5% equity to the US government makes strategic sense based on startup-corporate playbook dynamics.
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“What I've learned from my portfolio and I think you guys will agree is it creates an out an unexpectedly large amount of alignment. You get, you sell five percent of your company to a hundred billion dollar partner. It don't matter to Rory's point. It just don't matter if they own five percent of your startup. It doesn't matter if how, almost how big you are, it is immaterial, but I'm constantly shocked how much that brings you into the boardroom, how it brings you.”
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