Inside How Musk and Altman Went From Friends to Bitter Enemies

WSJ Tech News Briefing

The Wall Street Journal

News, Tech News

4.6 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 21 February 2025

⏱️ 13 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and billionaire Elon Musk were once friends and partners. Now they’re the major players in one of the meanest and highest-stakes fights in recent business history. WSJ reporter Berber Jin tells the inside story of their bromance to brawl and what it all means for the future of artificial intelligence. Charlotte Gartenberg hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free Technology newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:33.2	Welcome to Tech News Briefing. It's Friday, February 21st. I'm Charlotte Gartenberg for the Wall Street Journal.
0:39.5	It's one of the highest stakes and most personal fights in recent business history. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman versus Elon Musk,
0:47.4	the world's richest man and first buddy to President Trump. But Musk and Altman weren't always bitter enemies.
0:53.1	They began as friends and business partners.
0:56.0	The WSJ spoke with more than a dozen people familiar with Altman and Musk's relationship over the
1:01.1	years, as well as Open AI and Musk's business and political decisions to get the inside story of the
1:07.4	meanest fight in business.
1:13.9	A reporter Brze. story of the meanest fight in business. Our reporter Berber Jin has been covering this, and he's here now to take us through
1:17.9	the bromance-to-brawl timeline. Before we get into it, a quick note, News Corp, owner of the
1:23.3	Wall Street Journal, has a content licensing partnership with OpenAI.
1:34.0	Berber, on his first full day in office, President Trump appeared on TV next to OpenAI CEO,
1:39.6	Sam Altman, in the White House, to announce Stargate, this half trillion dollar investment in AI infrastructure.
1:41.4	Did Elon Musk know about this?
1:43.5	So Musk actually found out shortly before the
1:46.7	announcement was to go live that his nemesis Altman was in the White House and about to do a big
	...

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