OpenAI has hired the entire staff of Crossing Minds, a San Francisco-based startup that builds real-time recommendation and retrieval systems for e-commerce platforms, according to multiple industry reports published between 27 and 30 June. Financial terms were not disclosed, and the transaction is being characterised as an acqui-hire rather than an outright acquisition. Founded in 2017 by AI researchers Alexandre Robicquet and Emile Contal alongside Google X founder Sebastian Thrun, Crossing Minds raised about $13.5 million from investors including Index Ventures, Shopify, Plug and Play and Radical Ventures. Its software analyses on-site customer behaviour to generate personalised product and content suggestions without relying on third-party cookies. The move extends a run of talent-driven deals by OpenAI as it accelerates work on enterprise applications of generative AI. In the past year the ChatGPT developer has also announced agreements for search specialist Rockset and hardware startup io, part of a broader push to deepen its technical capabilities and diversify revenue streams.