Elon Musk launches $97bn bid to buy ChatGPT-maker OpenAI
Elon Musk co-founded the ChatGPT maker with Sam Altman in 2015 – but relations
between the pair have soured and they are already locked in a legal battle over
OpenAI.
Monday 10 February 2025 23:20, UK
A group led by Elon Musk has made a $97.4bn (£78.7bn) bid to buy OpenAI just
months after the X owner sued the artificial intelligence start-up.
Mr Musk [https://news.sky.com/topic/elon-musk-6730] co-founded OpenAI
[https://news.sky.com/topic/openai-10948] with its current chief executive Sam
Altman [https://news.sky.com/topic/sam-altman-10774] in 2015, but left before
the company took off after it released ChatGPT in late 2022.
Initially launched as a non-profit, OpenAI is currently transitioning to a
for-profit model – which it says it needs to do so it can afford to develop the
best AI models.
Mr Musk disagrees with the move and said in a press release about the bid: “It’s
time for OpenAI to return to the open-source, safety-focused force for good it
once was.
“We will make sure that happens.”
The offer is being backed by Mr Musk’s rival artificial intelligence company
xAI, which could merge with OpenAI following a deal, according to the Wall
Street Journal, which first reported the bid.
OpenAI was valued at $157bn (£127bn) in its latest funding round in October last
year. A deal of this size would require the investing group to raise enormous
funds.
Mr Musk’s offer appears to have escalated longstanding tensions with his former
colleague Mr Altman, who posted on X: “no thank you but we will buy twitter for
$9.74 billion if you want.”
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The pair publicly fell out when Mr Musk resigned from the OpenAI board in 2018.
They are already embroiled in a lawsuit as Mr Musk sued both OpenAI and Mr
Altman
[https://news.sky.com/story/elon-musk-sues-openai-and-sam-altman-saying-company-putting-profit-over-the-public-good-13084401]
last year, accusing them of breaching a contract by pivoting towards profit,
arguing OpenAI was going back on its pledge to develop AI carefully and make it
freely available.
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Mr Musk and OpenAI lawyers faced off in a California federal court last week as
a judge weighed up whether to back the X owner’s request for a court order that
would block the company from becoming a for-profit entity.
US district judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers has not yet ruled on the request but
said she would not stop the case from moving to a jury trial.
