The first clouds in his relationship with him began to form, as the former criticized the plan for massive private investment in artificial intelligence presented by the chairman of , claiming that the partners of this new joint venture “don’t have the money” to finance it , which head Sam Altman disputed.
From the White House, the US president unveiled a joint venture called Stargate, which plans to deploy “” in artificial intelligence infrastructure in the United States.
Stargate is joined by cloud specialist Oracle, Japanese investment giant SoftBank and genetic artificial intelligence company OpenAI (ChatGPT). Among the financiers of the project is also the investment fund MGX, which is supported by the United Arab Emirates.
“They don’t have the money”
The head of SoftBank, Masayoshi Son, clarified that the joint venture “will immediately begin to allocate 100 billion dollars”, with the aim of reaching a total of 500 billion within four years.
“They don’t have the money” to fund this program, Elon Musk claimed yesterday, Wednesday, from his X account.
“SoftBank has only $10 billion secured,” he claimed, adding: “I know that from a good source.”
The head of Tesla spent $277 million out of his own pocket to fund the election campaign of Donald Trump, who tasked him with cutting public spending by the US government.
“Lies, as you probably know,” OpenAI chief Sam Altman responded shortly via X, and suggested Elon Musk “come visit the first facility being built.”
“I realize that what is good for the country is not always good for your companies, but I hope that in your new role you will put the United States first,” Sam Altman continued.
Elon Musk vs. Sam Altman
Elon Musk, who co-founded OpenAI, regularly rails against Sam Altman, whom he mainly accuses of deviating from the company’s original mission, which was focused on a rational development of artificial intelligence.
For its part, SoftBank, contacted by AFP today, declined to comment and referred to the press release it issued yesterday.
Shares in SoftBank continued to rise on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, up 6% by midday today (local time), after gaining about 10% yesterday on Wednesday.
“The American people should believe what President Trump and these CEOs are saying: these investments are coming to our great country and American jobs are coming with them,” Donald Trump’s spokeswoman told Fox News. Caroline Leavitt.
According to the Wall Street Journal, SoftBank has about $30 billion in available liquidity and Oracle about $11 billion in cash and securities.
Oracle’s spending on its data center network was a few billion at last count.
For its part, according to a Bloomberg report, news website The Information claimed today that SoftBank and OpenAI each plan to invest $19 billion in Stargate and will then each control 40% of the capital.
Oracle and MGX will each contribute approximately $7 billion, with the remainder coming from limited partners and debt financing.
Stargate is mainly concerned with the construction of data collection and processing centers, the famous “data centers”.
The development of the cloud and artificial intelligence, mainly genetics, requires massive data storage capabilities, which has intensified the need for cutting-edge servers.
Elon Musk is himself involved in the artificial intelligence race, and the companies he controls, notably Tesla, have made massive investments in this field.
The genetic artificial intelligence company xAI, which launched in 2023, wants to build a “giant computing factory” in a former industrial site in Memphis, Tennessee.
