Sam Altman just dropped the inside story of how his partnership with Elon Musk fell apart — and it all came down to one word: control.
In a revealing interview on the Core Memory podcast, Altman detailed the early negotiations that ultimately led to Musk's departure from OpenAI. According to Altman, the four core members — himself, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, and Musk — all agreed that OpenAI needed to transition to a for-profit structure. The deal was almost done. Musk wanted a majority stake; they conceded. Musk wanted to be CEO so "everyone would know he was in charge"; they agreed to that, too.
But then Musk demanded something more: "absolute control" over OpenAI. That was the breaking point.
"No one person should have control over the entire future, whoever that person is," Altman said.
Altman called this version of events "something I've never told publicly for years," adding that the upcoming trial "leaves us no choice." He sees the courtroom as "an opportunity to tell the story" — but he's also worried Musk might drop the lawsuit before it gets there. "Then we won't get the chance to lay all this out," Altman said.
The trial is scheduled for April 27th. Musk is seeking between $79 billion and $134 billion in damages.
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