Elon Musk playing 'three dimensional chess' with $155bn bid for OpenAI
Elon Musk’s $US97.4bn ($155bn) bid to gain control of OpenAI has raised concerns among some of Australia’s tech sector, with some experts glad the billionaire Tesla boss wants the company to return to its non-profit roots while others say Musk is playing a game of “three dimensional chess”.
On Monday in the US, a Musk-led consortium of investors threw the multi-billion dollar sum at the non-profit which controls OpenAI.
Return to Non-Profit Roots
“It’s time for OpenAI to return to being an open-source, safety-focused force for good as it once was,” Musk said in a statement to The Wall Street Journal on Monday. “We will make sure that happens.” Hours later, Sam Altman, the boss of OpenAI, shot down the unsolicited offer, and returned fire with an offer to buy Musk’s social media platform X at one tenth of the price.
“No thank you but we will buy twitter (sic) for $9.74 billion if you want,” he wrote on the same platform. That might have been an offer of decimation from Mr Altman, said Australian AI expert professor Toby Walsh. “I don’t think Musk actually wants to buy OpenAI but he wants to settle scores with Sam Altman … particularly, I think he’d like to get rid of Sam Altman from OpenAI."
Legal Battle and Strategic Moves
Musk's bid ties into a court case Musk revived against OpenAI and Sam Altman in August last year. Musk has put a value on the company via a consortium of investors and will argue in his case against OpenAI “that you can’t just give away something that’s worth a lot,” Professor Walsh said.
University of Sydney Computer Science lecturer Dr Armin Chitizadeh shared some support for part of Musk’s plan. “While recruiting talent and running the infrastructure for machine learning tools is costly and cannot be sustained solely with donations, I would be glad if Mr Musk could make the company fully non-profit and run it as such,” Dr Chitizadeh said.
Differing Opinions
James Cook University adjunct professor Hallam Stevens shared a more cynical view, adding that Musk’s offer was “by some accounts, consistent with his poor management practices at X and elsewhere”. “Not only is Musk’s Trump-linked consolidation of power and control alarming, but also – assuming we think AI is strategically and economically important – we might be further alarmed by the fact that he will now be bringing his blunt approach to one of the leaders in this emerging field,” he said.
Sam Cust, the Director at Hyper Startup Studio, said he was concerned that “OpenAI continues down a path of increased commercialisation, driving up costs, it only raises the barrier to entry for start-ups”.
“Ensuring AI remains open and affordable for start-ups at all stages is crucial for increasing the number of Australian start-ups in the market and keeping Australia competitive on the global stage. Whoever leads OpenAI moving forward, their priority should be ensuring AI remains a force for innovation, not just profit,” he said.
This article first appeared in The Australian.
