Why Elon Musk and Sam Altman are feuding over $97,000,000,000 offer after once vowing to 'save humanity' together
Elon Musk's fractured relationship with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has been well documented now, but recent reports of a $98,000,000,000 bid have revealed further cracks that could impact wider policy due to the former's prominent role in the current Trump administration.
Having founded OpenAI together in 2015, Elon Musk and Sam Altman vowed to develop 'safe and beneficial' artificial intelligence systems that would prioritize the advancement of humanity over the desire for profits.
Just three years later Musk resigned from his role on the Board of Directors, citing initially a conflict of interest due to Tesla's own AI developments, but developments indicate that it was instead due to a power struggle where the company refused to let Musk take control and merge with the aforementioned car company.
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Subsequently, Musk has launched a number of legal actions against the ChatGPT creator, with one claiming that the company breached the initial mission to prioritize humanity over profits, and a subsequent lawsuit alleging attempts to create a monopoly through partnership with Microsoft, as reported by the Independent.
The former lawsuit was dropped by Musk, and OpenAI have denied allegations brought by the latter.
On top of this, OpenAI posted a letter addressing Musk's own desire to turn the company into a profit-driven venture, stating:
"In 2017, Elon not only wanted, but actually created, a for-profit as OpenAI's proposed new structure. When he didn't get majority equity and full control, he walked away and told us we would fail.
"Now that OpenAI is the leading AI research lab and Elon runs a competing AI company, he's asking the court to stop us from effectively pursuing our mission."
The letter is backed up with emails sent by Musk, but this is only the tip of an iceberg of conflict that continues to burn between the pair.
Only recently did Musk almost jeopardized his strong relationship with US President Donald Trump by criticizing a $500,000,000 AI-powered partnership with Altman at the helm, and new reports that Musk offered to purchase OpenAI indicate that this is far from over.
"It is time for OpenAI to return to the open-source, safety-focused force for good it once was," illustrated Marc Toberoff, an attorney representing the investors willing to purchase the company, in a statement. "We will make sure that happens."
Investors offered the OpenAI board a $97,400,000,000 package to purchase the company, with Elon Musk at the helm, and Altman wasn't too happy about the news.
"No thank you," Altman declared on X, "but we will buy Twitter for $9.74 billion if you want."
While this is simply just ten percent of the figure that Musk and his fellow investors proposed for OpenAI, it's actually likely not far off the actual value of X (formerly Twitter), as reports suggest that it's dropped 72% in value following the $44 billion purchase in 2022.
Altman has indicated in an interview with Bloomberg that Musk will "do all sorts of bad s***" in his new position of power, but he also doesn't think he'll use this to directly mess with a business competitor like OpenAI.
"He says a lot of things, starts them, undoes them, gets sued, sues, gets in fights with the government, gets investigated by the government," Altman jokingly details. "That's just Elon being Elon."
At least Altman can see the funny side of things despite the tension being arguably at its height, but it's clear that the feud isn't going away any time soon.