Musk co-chairs the launch of OpenAI
OpenAI was announced as a non-profit AI research lab with Elon Musk and Sam Altman as co-chairs.
Archive entry. This article looks back at an event from December 11, 2015. It was drafted with AI assistance from public records and is being fact-checked. See our About page.
On December 11, 2015, OpenAI was announced as a non-profit artificial intelligence research lab. Elon Musk and Sam Altman were its co-chairs, and the founders and backers pledged $1 billion in total.
Its stated mission was to develop artificial intelligence that benefits humanity as a whole. Musk had for years spoken publicly about the risks he saw in advanced AI.
In February 2018, Musk stepped down from the board, citing potential conflicts of interest with Tesla's own AI work. He has since been a vocal critic of the organization's direction, and in 2023 he announced his own AI company, xAI.
