Clash of the titans: Who said what in the clash between Musk, Altman and Nadella after Trump announced the $500 billion project for 'Al'

Elon Musk has used his social network X to poke fun at Sam Altman after US President Donald Trump announced a joint company with OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank.

Trump announced Stargate, a $500 billion Artificial Intelligence infrastructure investment project that would join forces with three companies.

Altman said that Stargate would allow AGI, or Artificial General Intelligence, to be built in the US.

But Musk thought differently.

"They actually don't have any money," he wrote in an X post, in response to an OpenAl post that said the company would start distributing $100 billion immediately as part of Stargate.

They don't actually have the money

- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 22, 2025

Announcing The Stargate Project

The Stargate Project is a new company which intends to invest $500 billion over the next four years building new AI infrastructure for OpenAI in the United States. We will start deploying $100 billion immediately. This infrastructure will secure…

- OpenAI (@OpenAI) January 21, 2025

"SoftBank has far less than $10 billion in assets. I know this for sure," Musk added in another post, without providing evidence to support his claim.

This followed the reaction of OpenAl CEO Sam Altman, writing foreign media, the Telegraph reports.

"I sincerely respect your achievements and think you are the most inspiring entrepreneur of our time," Altman wrote in response to Musk's post.

I genuinely respect your achievements and think you are the most inspiring entrepreneur of our time

- Sam Altman (@sama) January 22, 2025

But, a little over an hour later, Altman said in a separate post that he thought Musk was wrong about Stargate's financial capital.

He also invited the billionaire to visit the first site of the Stargate infrastructure.

"I understand that what's great for the country isn't always what's best for your companies, but in your new role I hope you'll put America first," Altman wrote.

It wasn't long before the Tesla CEO shared a post from Altman from December 2021, in which Altman thanked LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, saying he helped stop Trump from being reelected.

Very few people realize just how much @reidhoffman did and spent to stop Trump from getting re-elected–it seems reasonably likely to me that Trump would still be in office without his efforts. Thank you, Reid!

- Sam Altman (@sama) December 15, 2021

It is known that Altman was part of Trump's inauguration on January 20 and has had a more conciliatory tone towards this administration, stating that he changed his opinion of the president after seeing him more cautious recently.

"I don't agree with him on everything, but I think he'll be great for the country in many ways," Altman wrote in X.

watching @potus more carefully recently has really changed my perspective on him (I wish I had done more of my own thinking and definitely fell in the npc trap).

I'm not going to agree with him on everything, but I think he will be incredible for the country in many ways!

- Sam Altman (@sama) January 23, 2025

Otherwise, the richest man in the world has also reacted to a statement by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

Nadella was asked about the value of the investment in Donald Trump-backed Stargate after Musk's claims that they had no money for the project.

"I'm not aware of the details of what they're investing," Nadella said.

"Look, all I know is that I'm fine with my $80 billion," he added.

On January 3, Microsoft announced that it would invest about $80 billion in AI-enabled data centers to train AI models – with over half of the total investment in the US.

Following Nadella's statement, Musk wrote on X.

"On the other hand, Satya definitely has the money." /Telegraph/

On the other hand, Satya definitely does have the money https://t.co/VGBObPG7fM

- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 23, 2025