OpenAI officially rejects Musk’s $94 billion buyout offer

Feb 15

Brent Jabbour Senior Producer

By Brent Jabbour (Senior Producer)

OpenAI’s board rejected a bid to buy the company from Elon Musk. The company reiterated it is not for sale.
Musk claimed he would drop the offer if the company abandoned plans to shift to a for-profit model.
OpenAI’s lawyer said the “much-publicized ‘bid’ is in fact not a bid at all.”

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ChatGPT-maker OpenAI officially rejected Elon Musk’s $94.7 billion bid to buy the company. The startup said it is not for sale and said the decision by the company’s board was unanimous.

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"OpenAI is not for sale, and the board has unanimously rejected Mr. Musk's latest attempt to disrupt his competition. Any potential reorganization of OpenAI will strengthen our nonprofit and its mission to ensure AGI benefits all of humanity."

—Bret Taylor, Chair, on behalf of…
— OpenAI Newsroom (@OpenAINewsroom) February 14, 2025

In a letter to the lawyer of Elon Musk sent Friday, Feb. 14, OpenAI attorney, William Savitt, called the “much-publicized ‘bid’” from the consortium led by the world’s richest person was “in fact not a bid at all.”

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The “proposal, even as first presented, is not in the best interest of OAI’s mission and is rejected,” Savitt’s letter read. “The decision of the OAI board on this matter is unanimous.”

no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want
— Sam Altman (@sama) February 10, 2025

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman never took Musk’s offer to buy the nonprofit that oversees the maker of ChatGPT very seriously.

“No thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want,” Altman wrote on X.

“It’s ridiculous,” Altman said on the sidelines of the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in Paris. “The company is not for sale. It’s like another one of his tactics to try to mess with us.”

Musk cofounded OpenAI and said he provided the first $50 million of the company’s funding. Musk eventually left the company after disagreeing with his co-founders about the future direction of the company.

Musk later said he would rescind the offer if OpenAI dropped plans to move to a for-profit model.

“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,” lawyers for Musk wrote in a court filing late Wednesday, Feb. 12.

“OpenAI has gotten this far while having at least a sort of dual profit, nonprofit role,” Musk added. “What they’re trying to do now is completely delete the nonprofit, and that seems really going too far.”

“The nonprofit will continue as a very, very strong thing,” Altman told reporters in Paris on Thursday, Feb. 13. “The mission is really important, and we’re totally focused on making sure we preserve that.”

Altman conceded OpenAI “should probably open source somewhat more.”