Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, allegedly wanted the AI research company OpenAI to either merge with Tesla or give him full control of the organisation.

A blog post from OpenAI, in response to a lawsuit filed by Musk against the company, revealed email communications from 2015 to 2018 when Musk was still involved with the company’s operations. 

In one email from 2017 – as OpenAI was exploring a transition to a for-profit model to secure more funding – Musk reportedly wanted majority equity, control of the board of directors, and the CEO position. However, OpenAI felt this level of control by one individual would go against its mission.

“Elon wanted us to merge with Tesla or he wanted full control,” wrote OpenAI in their blog post. “Elon left OpenAI, saying there needed to be a relevant competitor to Google/DeepMind and that he was going to do it himself. He said he’d be supportive of us finding our own path.”

When the merger discussions stalled, Musk suggested in 2018 that OpenAI could become attached to Tesla as a path for the automaker to p