Musk Could Not Have Given OpenAI $100 Million He Always Claimed, Only $15 Million Can Be Traced: Report

A new report has claimed that only around $15 million of donations made to OpenAI can actually be traced back to Elon Musk. He has also reduced his claim of $100 million donation to OpenAI.

Musk could not have given the company the $100 million he always claimed.

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While tech billionaire Elon Musk, who is also the co-founder of OpenAI, the lab behind viral artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT openly expressed his disagreement with OpenAI since moving from its board in 2018, a new report has claimed that only around $15 million of donations can actually be traced back to the Tesla CEO. Musk also reduced his claim of $100 million donation to OpenAI, media reports say.

“I’m still confused as to how a non-profit to which I donated ~$100M somehow became a $30B market cap for-profit. If this is legal, why doesn’t everyone do it?” Musk had tweeted in March.

I’m still confused as to how a non-profit to which I donated ~$100M somehow became a $30B market cap for-profit. If this is legal, why doesn’t everyone do it?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 15, 2023

He posted on Twitter again: “I donated the first $100M to OpenAI when it was a non-profit, but have no ownership or control.”

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO always claimed he donated $100 million to the ChatGPT developer, which is now backed by Microsoft. Back in 2018, Musk tried to take control of OpenAI, but Sam Altman and OpenAI's other founders rejected his proposal. The outgoing Twitter CEO, in turn, walked away from OpenAI and reneged on a $1 billion planned donation, some reports suggest.

According to a CNBC interview, Musk strangely reduced his claim regarding the OpenAI donation, saying: "I'm not sure the exact number but it's some number on the order of $50 million."

However, as per a TechCrunch report, citing documents filed with the IRS and a state regulator, Musk could not have given the company the $100 million he always claimed.

"In fact, while the source of much of OpenAI's funding remains unclear, filings contain only around $15 million of donations that can be traced definitively back to Musk," the report said on Wednesday.

It should be noted that Musk, the outgoing CEO of Twitter, recently asserted that he played a significant role in the establishment of OpenAI, a Microsoft-backed artificial intelligence (AI) research lab. He claimed to have come up with the name and assisted in the recruitment of key scientists and engineers for the organization. However, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella strongly refuted Musk's claim that Microsoft exercises control over OpenAI.