Tesla CEO Elon Musk has this week claimed that the Artificial Intelligence industry would look very different today were it not for him.
Speaking in an interview with CNBC, Musk stated that he is “the reason that OpenAI exists”. OpenAI is the company behind ChatGPT, the leading AI chatbot in the world.
While it was already common knowledge that Musk was one of the early investors in the company, the controversial billionaire claimed that he played a much bigger role than previously reported.
“I came up with the name,” he stated.
Musk has previously voiced his belief that Microsoft has significant control over OpenAI and expressed doubts about OpenAI’s capped-profit model. Despite being an early supporter of the AI startup and initially committing to $1 billion in funding, Musk withdrew his support due to disagreements regarding the pace of OpenAI’s progress.
Ultimately, he invested approximately $50 million.
Musk also criticized OpenAI for not prioritizing safe AI development. Although he signed an open letter in March advocating for a pause in advanced AI development to establish safeguards, he acknowledged that the letter was unlikely to have a significant impact.
Interestingly, in April, Musk established a competing AI firm called X.AI.
Nevertheless, Musk stated that signing the letter was important to him “for the record.”
