Walt Disney has agreed to a deal with OpenAI that will allow some of its most iconic characters to be used in ChatGPT and the video generation tool Sora.
The three-year licensing arrangement, which will also see Disney invest $1 billion in OpenAI, constitutes something of a softening of Hollywood’s stance on AI, where many in the industry have expressed concerns about copyright issues, remuneration and potential job losses.
The agreement was unveiled the same day as the release of the latest version of ChatGPT-5.2, which the company described as its “most capable series yet for professional knowledge work.”
The Disney tie-up could be perceived as something of a surprise, which was acknowledged by Disney CEO Bob Iger, who said in an OpenAI blog post that it marked an “important moment” for the industry. Iger claimed the collaboration would “thoughtfully and responsibly extend the reach of our storytelling through generative AI, while respecting and protecting creators and their works.”
OpenAI said that the link-up will allow Sora to generate “short, user prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans” from a set of more than 200 of Disney’s most iconic characters, including those from Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars, as well as originals such as Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse.
However, the deal does not cover “talent likenesses or voices,” so it remains unclear what the characters will sound like.
Additionally, ChatGPT will be able to turn a few words by a user into fully generated images in seconds, drawing from the same bank of characters.
Curated Sora videos will be available on Disney+, while ChatGPT Images will start generating videos next year. The collaboration will also see Disney use OpenAI to build news tools and products and deploy ChatGPT to employees.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in the blog post that the agreement showed “how AI companies and creative leaders can work together responsibly to promote innovation” – an assertion with particular pertinence given that the collaboration was revealed on the same day reports emerged of a conflict between Disney and Google.
Speaking on CNBC, Iger confirmed that Disney sent a cease-and-desist letter to Google, accusing it of copyright infringement in pursuit of training and developing its AI models and services.
Meanwhile, the newly released ChatGPT-5.2 is targeted at those who use it professionally and is said to bring improvements in “creating spreadsheets, building presentations, writing code, perceiving images, understanding long contexts, using tools, and handling complex, multi-step projects.”
It’s available in a series of models — GPT‑5.2 Instant, GPT-5.2 Thinking and GPT-5.2 Pro — and is claimed to be more accurate, too, with GPT-5.2 Thinking delivering fewer hallucinations than its GPT-5.1 Thinking predecessor, resulting in 30% fewer responses with errors on a set of preidentified queries, according to OpenAI.
Mindful of the current concerns about AI safety, OpenAI said in its blog that it has also introduced “meaningful improvements in how they respond to prompts indicating signs of suicide or self harm, mental health distress.”
In ChatGPT, users with paid plans can start using all versions of GPT-5.2 immediately. In the API, they are available to all developers.
