Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

OpenAI Swiftly Rebuffs Musk's Surprise $97.4 Billion Buyout Attempt

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
67,515
37,818


Elon Musk on Monday led a consortium of investors in making a $97.4 billion unsolicited offer to acquire ChatGPT maker OpenAI's nonprofit arm – only to face immediate rejection from CEO Sam Altman.

open-ai-new-typeface.jpg

The Wall Street Journal reports that the bid included backing from Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI and prominent investors like Valor Equity Partners and Baron Capital. Musk co-founded OpenAI as a charity with Altman in 2015.

"It's time for OpenAI to return to the open-source, safety-focused force for good it once was," Musk said in a statement through his lawyer Marc Toberoff. The consortium pledged to match or exceed any competing offers.

Altman quickly dismissed the proposal on X (formerly Twitter) with a pointed response: "No thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want" – an apparent jab at Musk's $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in 2022.

Musk responded to the post with a one-word reply: "Swindler."

The attempted takeover comes amid OpenAI's ongoing transition from a nonprofit to a for-profit structure, with the company recently valued at $157 billion. The transformation has been contentious between Musk and his former colleagues. There have been multiple lawsuits where Musk has accused OpenAI of betraying its founding principles.

In a message to employees reported by WSJ, Altman reassured staff that OpenAI's structure prevents any individual from taking control of the company, describing Musk's offer as "tactics to try and weaken us because we are making great progress."

The bid's investor group included other backers such as Atreides Management, Vy Capital, and 8VC, a venture firm led by Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale, along with Hollywood executive Ari Emanuel's investment fund.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Article Link: OpenAI Swiftly Rebuffs Musk's Surprise $97.4 Billion Buyout Attempt
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2025/02/11/openai-rebuffs-musk-buyout-attempt/
  • Wow
  • Haha
Reactions: Lioness~, amartinez1660, SFjohn and 1 other person
Musk is salty because AI turned out to be a bigger and more world changing innovation than anything he's done, as cool as his rockets are and as great as Tesla was at popularising EVs. Sam Altman is going to get more pages in the history books than Musk.
 
  • Like
  • Haha
  • Disagree
Reactions: Dutch60, Damian., klm9210 and 47 others
SoldOnApple said:
Musk is salty because AI turned out to be a bigger and more world changing innovation than anything he's done, as cool as his rockets are and as great as Tesla was at popularising EVs. Sam Altman is going to get more pages in the history books than Musk.
Click to expand...
What probably more contributed to it is that this is a company that very specifically *didn't* want Musk to have control over it, and has become a success despite (or mayhaps more likely; because of) kicking him out.

Musk has a serious ego problem. I don't know who said it first, but it can all be summed up to this: "He knows the world needs saving, but he'll burn it to the ground if it isn't him who saves it."
 
  • Like
  • Disagree
  • Love
Reactions: Chuckeee, ericgtr12, ADHWGT and 52 others
Musk is just trying to make it harder for Altman to turn OpenAI into a for-profit. The OpenAI charity needs to be compensated if OpenAI becomes a for-profit and OpenAI is incentivized to make its valuation as low as possible. Musk just royally fked that up (and probably a fair thing to do too).
 
  • Like
Reactions: robd003, Bradbitz11, entropys and 9 others
SoldOnApple said:
Musk is salty because AI turned out to be a bigger and more world changing innovation than anything he's done, as cool as his rockets are and as great as Tesla was at popularising EVs. Sam Altman is going to get more pages in the history books than Musk.
Click to expand...
(looks at the news) No, pretty sure what he's doing right now is going to get him quite a few chapters in the history books. Unfortunately.
 
  • Like
  • Love
Reactions: ADHWGT, freedomlinux, RealE and 16 others
lixuelai said:
Musk is just trying to make it harder for Altman to turn OpenAI into a for-profit. The OpenAI charity needs to be compensated if OpenAI becomes a for-profit and OpenAI is incentivized to make its valuation as low as possible. Musk just royally fked that up (and probably a fair thing to do too).
Click to expand...
Ding ding ding. He was doing this to set a floor (of current value) for the comp they need to pay with the spin out to a for profit. That makes it more expensive and harder to raise funding for open ai has said it plans to do.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Bradbitz11, Timpetus, phoenix303 and 2 others
SoldOnApple said:
Musk is salty because AI turned out to be a bigger and more world changing innovation than anything he's done, as cool as his rockets are and as great as Tesla was at popularising EVs. Sam Altman is going to get more pages in the history books than Musk.
Click to expand...
I think you just dont like Musk personally because this is an all time terrible take. Sending rockets to space and reviving a dying space program as well as making electric cars mainstream, will have a much bigger impact than anything AI can do, and it's not even close.
 
  • Like
  • Disagree
  • Haha
Reactions: entropys, qwertypop, GUNSTAR1 and 15 others
bigjnyc said:
I think you just dont like Musk personally because this is an all time terrible take. Sending rockets to space and reviving a dying space program as well as making electric cars mainstream, will have a much bigger impact than anything AI can do, and it's not even close.
Click to expand...
I don't like Musk. Personally.

But you seem to have zero understanding of what AI is already capable of doing and what is coming very soon.

...Else, why did Musk make an offer?
 
  • Like
  • Disagree
Reactions: 1m4tr, GUNSTAR1, iMean and 5 others
SoldOnApple said:
Musk is salty
Click to expand...

He’s a troll and chaos agent who is funded by dictatorships who pump up his stock to bribe him. Same thing Trump does with all his listed companies, properties, gold sneakers and meme coins. It’s all bribery.

The enemy has taken over and is gutting your government. The next phase is to turn a blind eye to terrorism around the world so that private armies and private construction companies can get fat contracts. They will not be your friends. They will blow up neighborhoods all over the place using false excuses.
 
  • Like
  • Love
  • Haha
Reactions: Chuckeee, Dutch60, Imperial926 and 27 others
Timo_Existencia said:
I don't like Musk. Personally.

But you seem to have zero understanding of what AI is already capable of doing and what is coming very soon.

...Else, why did Musk make an offer?
Click to expand...

Because his ego is hurt that the company is successful without him, nothing more. Altman and Musk are both clowns, but Musk has a bigger nose.

As for AI, it's interesting, for some things...LLMs are lame as hell though.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
  • Love
Reactions: Chuckeee, Damian., CarlJ and 4 others
Kiwamu said:
Not only that. I am sure Musk will go to the White House to force a deal or something. I expect the headline soon that there will be a congressional hearing and investigation into OpenAi.
Click to expand...
Why bother with all that vaguely democratic stuff? Just get his mate Flump to sign a diktat. Slip it in alongside the "I don't like paper straws" one he just signed.
 
  • Like
  • Love
  • Disagree
Reactions: Chuckeee, Dutch60, robd003 and 10 others
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back