tech
May 8, 2026
Microsoft was worried OpenAI would run off to Amazon and ‘shit-talk’ Azure
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TL;DR
- Court documents from the Musk v. Altman trial reveal early communications about a Microsoft-OpenAI partnership.
- OpenAI initially sought significant funding from Microsoft for AI research, proposing a $300 million deal.
- Microsoft executives, including Jason Zander and Kevin Scott, expressed concerns about the cost and potential benefits.
- A major concern was OpenAI defecting to Microsoft's competitor, Amazon, and speaking negatively about Microsoft and Azure.
- Despite initial hesitations, Microsoft invested $1 billion in OpenAI a year later.
- The partnership has evolved, with OpenAI now able to offer its AI models on AWS (Amazon Bedrock).