Elon Musk will withdraw his $97.4 billion bid for OpenAI’s non-profit arm if the ChatGPT maker stops its conversion into a for-profit entity, according to a court filing.
“If OpenAI, Inc.’s Board is prepared to preserve the charity’s mission and stipulate to take the ‘for sale’ sign off its assets by halting its conversion, Musk will withdraw the bid,” read the filing, which was submitted Wednesday to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
“Otherwise, the charity must be compensated by what an arms-length buyer will pay for its assets,” it added.
On Monday, Musk, along with his artificial intelligence company xAI and a consortium of investors, launched a bid to acquire OpenAI’s non-profit arm for $97.4 billion, accusing the firm and its CEO Sam Altman of abandoning its original mission to develop AI for good and of pursuing profits instead.
Altman has rebuffed the offer, telling CNBC that the move is just an effort by Musk to “slow down a competitor.”
OpenAI was initially founded as a non-profit in 2015 and later converted to a “capped profit” model in 2019. Musk helped launch the AI research firm, to which he says he donated $50 million.
Since his departure from the company’s board in 2018, the Tesla and SpaceX founder has expressed vocal frustration with OpenAI’s move toward becoming a for-profit company.
Musk reiterated those concerns on Thursday, speaking to an audience via videolink at the World Governments Summit in Dubai.
Asked by the United Arab Emirates’ AI Minister Omar al Olama whether a company like OpenAI could really scale as a non-profit, Musk replied:
“I think the evidence was there in that OpenAI has gotten this far while having at least a sort of dual profit, non-profit role. What they’re trying to do now is completely delete the non-profit. And that seems really going too far.”
“I provided all of the funding for OpenAI for the first almost $50 million for nothing, as a non-profit, and it was meant to be open source,” Musk went on. “And so, you know, I think this is analogous to, like … if you find a non-profit to preserve the Amazon rainforest, but then … instead they turn into a lumber company and chop down the trees and sell them for wood.”
He added that OpenAI should now change its name to “maximum profit AI,” or to “closed for voracious profit.”
CNBC has contacted OpenAI for comment. Altman in December said that his company decided to move to a capped-profit structure in part because Musk stopped funding it, while supporters of OpenAI’s conversion to a fully for-profit public benefit corporation — which could take two years — say this will better allow it to scale and make it more attractive to investors.
Asked on Tuesday how seriously he is taking Musk’s bid, Altman, who previously declined the offer in a post on X, replied, “Not particularly.”
