OpenAI Board Unanimously Rejects Musk's 140 Trillion Won Acquisition Proposal

Sam Altman, CEO and founder of OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, is attending the 'Kakao Media Day' held at the Plaza Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul on the 4th, having a conversation with Jeong Sin-ah, CEO of Kakao. Photo by Kang Jin-hyung

The board of OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, officially rejected the acquisition proposal from Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, on the 14th (local time). Musk had made an acquisition offer of $97.4 billion (approximately 141 trillion KRW) on the 10th.

Brett Taylor, chairman of the OpenAI board, stated on behalf of the board in a statement that day, "OpenAI is not for sale, and the board unanimously rejected Musk's recent attempts to disrupt competitors."

He also said, "Potential restructuring of OpenAI will strengthen our nonprofit organization and our mission that artificial general intelligence (AGI) benefits all of humanity."

Elon Musk, who co-founded OpenAI with CEO Sam Altman 10 years ago but later left and has been in opposition, recently formed a consortium with investment funds to purchase OpenAI's assets, proposing a cash buyout.

Altman had already expressed his refusal to this proposal. On the 11th, Altman criticized Musk's acquisition offer as "nonsense" and called it "another scheme to shake us."