OpenAI’s board of administrators has “unanimously” rejected billionaire Elon Musk’s supply to purchase the nonprofit that successfully governs OpenAI, the corporate stated on Friday.
In a statement shared by way of OpenAI’s press account on X, Bret Taylor, board chair, known as Musk’s bid “an try and disrupt […] competitors.”
“OpenAI will not be on the market, and the board has unanimously rejected Mr. Musk’s newest try and disrupt his competitors,” Taylor stated. “Any potential reorganization of OpenAI will strengthen our nonprofit and its mission to make sure [artificial general intelligence] advantages all of humanity.”
On Monday, Musk, his AI firm, xAI, and a gaggle of buyers provided to purchase OpenAI’s nonprofit for $97.4 billion. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and the corporate’s board administrators shortly — however not formally — dismissed the unsolicited proposal. In a statement, Andy Nussbaum, the counsel representing OpenAI’s board, stated Musk’s bid “doesn’t set a worth for [OpenAI’s] nonprofit” and that the nonprofit is “not on the market.”
Musk, an OpenAI co-founder, final yr introduced a lawsuit in opposition to the corporate and Altman that alleges that OpenAI engaged in anticompetitive conduct and fraud, amongst different offenses.
OpenAI was based as a nonprofit earlier than it transitioned to a “capped-profit” construction in 2019. The nonprofit is the only controlling shareholder of the capped-profit OpenAI company, which retains formal fiduciary accountability to the nonprofit’s constitution. OpenAI is now within the technique of restructuring — this time to a standard for-profit firm, particularly a public profit company. However Musk, by way of the lawsuit, is in search of to enjoin the conversion.
In a courtroom submitting on Wednesday, attorneys for Elon Musk stated the billionaire will withdraw his bid if OpenAI’s board “protect[s] the charity’s mission” and halt the corporate’s conversion to a for-profit. In a filing earlier the same day, attorneys for OpenAI known as Musk’s transfer to take management of the corporate “an improper bid to undermine a competitor,” and a contradiction of his place in courtroom {that a} switch of the startup’s belongings by restructuring would breach its mission as a charitable belief.