Elon Musk and a group of investors have made a $97.4 billion offer to buy OpenAI’s controlling non-profit entity. The bid was submitted to OpenAI’s board, according to a report by WSJ. However, neither OpenAI nor Musk has publicly commented on it yet. The situation is significant because Musk (who is also leading this consortium of investors) and OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, have a history of conflicts.
Musk was originally involved in OpenAI’s founding in 2015 but has since been critical of its shift from a non-profit to a for-profit model, especially after securing major investments from Microsoft and others. Musk has accused OpenAI of straying from its original mission of creating AI for the benefit of humanity and has criticized its lack of openness and focus on safety. This, coupled with his public conflicts with Altman, seem to have a led to a more serious step from Musk, going as far as buying controlling stake.
Musk’s attorney, Marc Toberoff, confirmed the development, as per the report. Toberoff submitted the bid to OpenAI’s board on February 10. According to Musk’s statement in the WSJ report, he believes OpenAI has drifted away from its original values, and he wants to restore its commitment to openness and safety.
The bid is backed by Musk’s own AI company, xAI (founded in 2023), which suggests that if the deal goes through, xAI and OpenAI could merge. OpenAI’s Sam Altman however, has publicly come out and rejected the deal with a post on X, saying “no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want”, thus directly acknowledging that there indeed was an attempt to buy out controlling stake in OpenAI. Here’s Altman’s original post:
no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want
— Sam Altman (@sama) February 10, 2025
The offer comes at a time when several reports suggest that SoftBank is planning to invest around $15-25 billion in the AI trendsetter firm – OpenAI at over $300 billion valuation. Notably, OpenAI reached a valuation of approximately $157 billion in its last funding round in October 2024, when the company raised nearly $6.6 billion. So far, the ChatGPT maker has raised a total of $17.9 billion in funding over 10 rounds.
OpenAI is also a prominent part of the recently announced Stargate Project in the United States, which primarily aims to develop new data centres to support AI advancements and generate over 100,000 jobs across the country. Just after Donald Trump’s inauguration as the new US president, SoftBank, OpenAI, Oracle, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Abu Dhabi-based MGX announced the initiative. Under this project (more precisely, the joint venture) these companies intend to allocate around $500 billion over the next four years to strengthen AI infrastructure in the US.
Coming back to the row between Elon Musk and OpenAI, last year, Musk sued OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman. He alleged that OpenAI was initially founded as a non-profit project rather than for financial gain. He argues that now the ChatGPT maker has only focused on profit-making. In December 2024, a non-profit organization, Encode also joined Elon Musk’s effort to block OpenAI’s transition to a for-profit entity.
