New Delhi, December 15: OpenAI hits back at Elon Musk, stating that he initially wanted the company to adopt a for-profit structure. The revelation comes amid Musk's legal battles against OpenAI, where he claims the organisation has moved away from its founding mission as a non-profit. OpenAI shared emails and texts that suggest Elon Musk pushed for a for-profit model back in 2017. The situation has escalated as Elon Musk's xAI competes with OpenAI.

Elon Musk’s legal filing against OpenAI indicates his fourth attempt in less than a year to reframe his claims regarding the company's structure. In response, OpenAI published a series of emails and texts in a blog post that highlights Musk's earlier support for an OpenAI for-profit model. OpenAI said, "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." OpenAI Introduces ‘Projects’ To Simplify Organising Chats and Files for ChatGPT Users.

Timeline of Events

In November 2015, OpenAI was established as a nonprofit organisation, which raised some questions from Elon Musk. By December of the same year, OpenAI made its public announcement about its mission and goals. As the company progressed in its research during early 2017, it became clear that it would require billions of dollars to acquire the computing power necessary to develop Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).

By the summer of 2017, OpenAI and Elon Musk agreed that transitioning to a for-profit model was essential for the company to further its mission. However, in the Autumn of 2017, Elon demanded to have majority ownership, and complete control, and to take on the role of CEO for the new for-profit entity. In September 2017, he established a public benefit corporation named “Open Artificial Intelligence Technologies, Inc.”

OpenAI turned down Elon Musk's demands, as granting him sole control over OpenAI and its technology would go against its core mission. In January 2018, Elon expressed his belief that OpenAI was destined to fail unless it merged with Tesla. Elon Musk Promoting Crypto Giveaways? X User Warns About Deepfake Video Scam, Urges To Stay Safe (Watch Video).

The following month, Elon Musk stepped down from his position as co-chair of OpenAI. By December 2018, he urged OpenAI to secure “billions per year immediately or forget it.” In March 2019, OpenAI introduced OpenAI LP, a capped-profit model that operates within the non-profit and in March 2023, Elon Musk launched his competitor to OpenAI, called xAI.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Dec 15, 2024 07:01 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).