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Altman was raising billions from Middle East sovereign funds for AI chip startup
- WhereIsTheTruth 3y agoHmm, is this why the press keep saying that microsoft was "blindsided" by the announcement? was it an attempt to cover this eventuality - because of conflict of interests? They also announced wanting to build their own AI chip lol
- pixl97 3y agoI wonder if anyone at Microsoft disclosed details to Altman about the chips? Also wonder when the lawsuits over stuff will start flying. Not sure what about, but with this many hurt feelings and potential betrayals, I'm sure someone will.
- poniko 3y ago100% sure he was fired because he started some side hustle to get a bigger chunk of the ai cake. In a few we will have some launch of a new venture and a bunch of openai peeps will flip over to the new co.
- tmpz22 3y agoWill this be good or bad for the general public?
- MVissers 3y agoImpossible to say. If OpenAI makes it– I think it'll be better for AI safety then with Sam at the helm. But that's a big if. Time will tell.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Stevvo 3y agoIn Europe, Saudi's are well known for making sound use of their capital. They own much London because of it.
- throwaway5959 3y agoDepends on how your values align with those of Middle East sovereign wealth funds and their owners.
- medler 3y agoThis article appears to be their source: https://archive.ph/wQOhC https://archive.ph/wQOhC > Alongside rifts over strategy, board members also contended with Altman’s entrepreneurial ambitions. Altman has been looking to raise tens of billions of dollars from Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds to create an AI chip startup to compete with processors made by Nvidia Corp., according to a person with knowledge of the investment proposal. Altman was courting SoftBank Group Corp. chairman Masayoshi Son for a multibillion-dollar investment in a new company to make AI-oriented hardware in partnership with former Apple designer Jony Ive. Sutskever and his allies on the OpenAI board chafed at Altman’s efforts to raise funds off of OpenAI’s name, and they harbored concerns that the new businesses might not share the same governance model as OpenAI, the person said.
- nytesky 3y agoSo he was looking to build his own AI chips with a company he owned and supply them to OpenAI? And enlist SoftBank for funding? Isn’t this very similar to Adam Neumans tactics?
- Zetobal 3y agoOther peoples Ideas and other peoples money, pretty on topic.
- gumballindie 3y agoIsnt that how most ai is built anyway? Taking what’s not theirs and selling it for profit?
- Red_Leaves_Flyy 3y agoSomething something greater good
- mopenstein 3y agoIsn't that exactly how humans have been able to progress so far? By standing on the shoulders of others to reach higher and higher lofts? If you don't want your knowledge to be used by machines or man, then you should bottle them up and hide them from both.
- sroussey 3y agoI thought he invested in several AI chip companies. Which one is this about?
- bmitc 3y agoVenture capitalists and entrepreneurs will sell this country and our freedom for a dollar, ego, and power. It's already happened and is happening at increasing rates.
- s5300 3y ago[dead]
- HHC-Hunter 3y agoGood old built in the USA.
- Aaronstotle 3y agoThe cynic in me is reminded of this over and over again, to a point where I now think: what could be more American then putting profit over everything?
- elforce002 3y agoWas there any time when the US (or the rest of the world for that matter) practiced responsible capitalism?
- bmitc 3y agoThat's a really good question, and I'm personally not sure of the answer to it. I am not an expert of their presidencies and policies, but I've always been under the impression, from the little I have read, that the presidencies of the two Roosevelts and Taft kept capitalism in the U.S. reasonable. If someone has more information on whether this is an accurate impression or not, it would be good to know.
- moogly 3y agoToo many hands in too many cookie jars, this feels like.
- sgt 3y agoMy take too. Honestly, I don't feel like Sam Altman is a trustworthy character at all. But that's just a feeling based on my observations, I don't know him.
- readyplayernull 3y agoHoarding tech and assets for his own ventures, expecting more to come from SAlty.
- mikrl 3y agoHe is not the only AI related entity doing business in the Middle East. Look at G42’s and King Abdullah University’s partnership with Cerebras Systems. I was not aware that the Arab states were such a Mecca (pun very much intended) for AI, but there must be something there… why pass over any number of American partnerships? Especially in today’s geopolitical climate.
- nabla9 3y agoGulf states and their sovereign wealth funds are great source of dumb money.
- dijit 3y agoI mean, I'll state the obvious: Money. That, and despite a lot of really bad PR (and a lot of very real human rights abuses) the Saudi's are not as black as they're painted.
- mikrl 3y agoG42 is Emirati, but KAUST is Saudi as you mentioned. Not sure what the PR on the UAE is like.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- csours 3y agoBecause the Middle East has oil money, and they know that the age of oil is coming to a close (or that there is some risk that it is coming to a close, same same, see also option pricing) and they want to mitigate the loss of income by investing in stuff.
- mikrl 3y agoMoney is one thing, geopolitical risk is another much more turbulent force than the markets.
- bart_spoon 3y ago
- b2bsaas00 3y agoI don’t understand why people with such amount of cash still looking for VC instead of bootstrapping their company.
- cjbprime 3y agoYou don't "bootstrap" a chip fab.
- wutwutwat 3y agoAlso lol why would he risk his own money when he can keep it, risk other people's money, and end up richer on the other side even if he fails?
- hakdbha 3y ago[dead]
- VirusNewbie 3y agoMaybe elon could. But very few people can.
- potatopatch 3y agoYou rent it from TSMC, just like nvidia.
- jstummbillig 3y agoHow much money do you think sama has available? I understand that we easily get confused when dealing with fantasy money numbers, but the higher the number, the more the exact number of zeroes actually matters.
- wslh 3y agoBecause you want to share risk? You can play more games if you share risk.
- efficax 3y agoyou can always be richer and more powerful
- realce 3y ago[flagged]
- morph123 3y agoYou think life was better before oil?
- realce 3y ago[flagged]
- dang 3y agoCan you please not post in the flamewar style and also please not fulminate in HN comments? It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
- realce 3y agoapologies, fixed.
- Permik 3y agoThey're probably not trying to convey that. But, to take a stab at that, yes, I personally think there can be some very specific viewpoints that, if compared to how things are today, some aspects of life were quantifiably better than they are today. If we're holistic about it? Then all the human, technological and societal progress probably overshadows those teeny-tiny aspects of human life that were better before oil. It all depends on your own viewpoint and what you personally think is valuable in life.
- timeon 3y agoAre you not considering climate change?
- hakdbha 3y ago[dead]
- say_it_as_it_is 3y agoHe helped make a new pie and decided to take a slice
- gigel82 3y agoWell well how the turntables...
- neonate 3y agohttps://finance.yahoo.com/news/openai-ceo-ouster-followed-debates-053522427.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/openai-ceo-ouster-followed-de...
- jstummbillig 3y agoI don't really get the sentiment in this thread. There is an enormous chip shortage and we are just about getting started with useful AI. The chips are not optional and his or rather OpenAIs current mission hinges on their availability. If Sama feels the current players are not doing enough, it seems entirely in line with his publicly stated and often repeated goal of advancing AI, that he would try and move things along. That's just extremely consequential execution.
- jncfhnb 3y agoUsing OpenAI’s name to get funding for a startup that would profit by selling to OpenAI is not fair game
- jsnell 3y agoThe supply of chips is limited by foundry capacity, starting a new fabless chip designer would do nothing to fix that bottleneck. A new chip designer would also not be releasing a competitive product for at least 5 years, even if done by the most talented and experienced engineering team of the generation (rather than by a career bullshitter like Altman). This would most likely have been a pure grift play, finding some stupid money and using his position at OpenAI to convince them to invest in a doomed proposition.
- foogazi 3y ago> A new chip designer would also not be releasing a competitive product for at least 5 years Best time to start was 10 years ago…
- jsnell 3y agoSure, but there must be dozens of credible AI chip startups in various parts of their lifecycle started in the last decade. If the goal really was, as originally proposed, to solve the chip bottleneck for OpenAI you'd be better of backing one of those. And if literally all of these startups are on the wrong path and OpenAI beliefs a different kind of design philosophy would work better, I'm sure most if not all of those startups would be delighted to know about it, and quickly change their plans. Starting from scratch would make sense if Altman personally were some kind of chip design savant with unique insight to the problem domain, and he definitely isn't that. Alternatively it makes sense if had nothing to do with saving OpenAI from the compute bottleneck, and was another one of Altman's Worldcoin-like grifter schemes.
- testemailfordg2 3y agoWhen you are ahead of the curve...OpenAI was only a job or a hop for him, to move on to his next venture...One day that was eventually going to happen, either under OpenAI if the board approved or if he only wanted the fruits of success for himself less the baggage.
- pilgrim0 3y ago“Icarus ignored Daedalus’s instructions not to fly too close to the sun, causing the beeswax in his wings to melt. Icarus fell from the sky, plunged into the sea, and drowned.” Strikingly fit metaphor for Altman.