The Morning After: Musk wants to buy OpenAI. It doesn’t want to be bought.

Elon Musk has launched a $97.4 billion bid for AI darling OpenAI. The Wall Street Journal reported that a group of investors led by Musk’s xAI submitted an unsolicited offer to the company’s board of directors on Monday. It’s a bid for the non-profit that controls OpenAI’s for-profit arm.
OpenAI is not a traditional company, and the non-profit structure Sam Altman and others at the company want it to get away from may, in fact, protect it from Musk’s offer.
There’s further drama around all this: Musk had sued OpenAI and Sam Altman for allegedly ditching its non-profit mission around this time last year.
An OpenAI spokesperson pointed Engadget to an X post from CEO Sam Altman that said, “No thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want.” Musk’s purchase of Twitter was a heady lump of money that didn’t lead to a typical ROI. It did, however, help him attach himself to President Trump’s successful bid for office.
— Mat Smith
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This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/the-morning-after-engadget-newsletter-121537981.html?src=rss
Elon Musk has launched a $97.4 billion bid for AI darling OpenAI. The Wall Street Journal reported that a group of investors led by Musk’s xAI submitted an unsolicited offer to the company’s board of directors on Monday. It’s a bid for the non-profit that controls OpenAI’s for-profit arm. OpenAI…
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