Elon Musk created for-profit structure for OpenAI; Sam Altman’s startup hits back at Tesla CEO

San Francisco-based OpenAI has added a new twist to its ongoing controversy with Elon Musk by releasing a list of emails on its website claiming that the Tesla CEO wanted a for-profit structure for the startup. Notably, Musk has been overly critical of OpenAI changing its status from non-profit to for-profit, and has also sued the company, while adding Microsoft to the mix.

In a blog post on Saturday, OpenAI said Musk not only wanted for-profit status for the company, but also proposed a new structure. OpenAI shared documents showing that Elon Musk instructed his wealth manager, Jared Birchall, to register a company called “Open Artificial Intelligence Technologies, Inc.”, which would be the for-profit arm of OpenAI.

“Elon Musk’s latest legal filing against OpenAI marks his fourth attempt in less than a year to reframe his claims. However, his own words and actions speak for themselves” OpenAI wrote in the blogpost

“In 2017, Elon not only wanted, but actually created, a for-profit as OpenAI’s proposed new structure. When he didn’t get majority equity and full control, he walked away and told us we would fail. Now that OpenAI is the leading AI research lab and Elon runs a competing AI company, he’s asking the court to stop us from effectively pursuing our mission.” the blogpost added

Meanwhile, OpenAI also challenged Musk’s contention to stop OpenAI’s shift to a for-profit company in a federal court. In a separate legal filing, the ChatGPT maker said what Musk is asking would “debilitate OpenAI’s business, board deliberations, and mission to create safe and beneficial A.I. — all to the advantage of Musk and his own A.I. company,”

Elon Musk wanted to accumulate wealth to build city on Mars, claims OpenAI: 

OpenAI also claimed that Musk wanted majority stake in the for-profit arm of the company. The AI startup claimed that Musk said that he did not care about the money but instead wanted to accumulate $80 billion in wealth in order to build a city on Mars.