OpenAI recruits xAI's former CFO Mike Liberatore amid Musk-Altman feud

The hiring of xAI's CFO by OpenAI is expected to escalate the talent rivalry between CEO Sam Altman and Elon Musk, intensifying one of tech's biggest feuds

OpenAI has appointed Mike Liberatore, former Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of xAI, after he resigned from Elon Musk’s company just a few months into the role, CNBC reported.

 

Liberatore will take charge as the US startup’s business finance officer, managing billions of dollars in AI infrastructure expenditure. He will report to OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar starting Tuesday. Liberatore had joined xAI earlier this year, contributing to the company’s fundraising efforts and the expansion of its data centre in Memphis. However, he left xAI in July, merely three months after joining, The Wall Street Journal reported.

 

Vacancy at xAI amid fundraising 

Liberatore’s exit leaves a significant vacancy at xAI, which has been aggressively raising funds to expand its AI infrastructure, including data centre projects and development of computing chips.

 

Looking back at Altman-Musk feud 

The appointment is likely to heighten tensions between OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Elon Musk, who are embroiled in one of the tech industry’s most high-profile disputes. Elon Musk collaborated with Sam Altman to co-found OpenAI a decade ago before establishing his own rival venture.

 

Since then, Musk has repeatedly attempted to block OpenAI’s efforts to restructure as a conventional for-profit business. He filed two lawsuits against OpenAI, alleging it deviated from its founding principles, and sought court intervention to halt the proposed restructuring.

 

OpenAI, Microsoft set to revamp partnership

 

OpenAI has projected that by the end of the decade, it will share about 8 per cent of its revenue with commercial partners, primarily Microsoft, down from the current 20 per cent, The Information reported. The difference between these figures amounts to over $50 billion in additional revenue that OpenAI would retain.

 

Microsoft and OpenAI have signed a non-binding agreement outlining new relationship terms that would enable OpenAI to restructure itself as a for-profit company.

 

Under the present arrangement, OpenAI stated that its nonprofit arm would receive more than $100 billion—approximately 20 per cent of the $500 billion valuation it seeks in private markets—positioning it among the world’s best-funded nonprofit operations.