The AI race was never going to be polite. But what’s unfolding in Silicon Valley in 2025 looks more like Succession meets Black Mirror than a traditional tech rivalry. Forget code. This is about power, control, and a rapidly closing window to dominate the most transformative technology in history.

At the center of the fight: three men, three worldviews, and one finish line.

Let’s break down the combatants.

1. Sam Altman vs. Elon Musk

This one is personal and litigious. Musk and Altman co-founded OpenAI in 2015 as a nonprofit devoted to building safe, open-source artificial intelligence. But the bromance collapsed when Musk attempted to take control of the company in 2018 and failed. He left bitterly and has been attacking OpenAI ever since.

In 2023, Musk sued OpenAI and Altman, accusing them of betraying the nonprofit’s mission by aligning too closely with Microsoft and putting profit over safety. The lawsuit is still grinding through federal court. Among other things, it claims OpenAI’s flagship product, ChatGPT, is a closed-source commercial weapon funded by Big Tech and wrapped in secrecy.

Altman denies the betrayal and OpenAI has countersued. The legal drama is thick and both sides have subpoenaed internal documents.

Meanwhile, Musk’s xAI is developing its own ChatGPT rival and launching it on X (formerly Twitter).

This is a very public and very expensive fight over who gets to define ethical AI.

Stakes: Both want to build AGI, or Artificial General Intelligence, a system smarter than humans. Musk wants to do it his way with radical transparency and no corporate strings. Altman wants to do it with Microsoft money, oversight, and a mission-first approach. The future of AI safety and perhaps civilization is the prize.

2. Sam Altman vs. Microsoft

They were supposed to be on the same team. Microsoft has invested over $13 billion in OpenAI and uses ChatGPT to power Bing, Copilot, and Azure. But now the two companies are increasingly at odds and headed for a potential breach.

Microsoft has quietly built its own internal AI team called MAI, which is developing foundation models independent of OpenAI. The company wants more control, fewer surprises, and possibly a total replacement.

Altman, meanwhile, has turned OpenAI into a hybrid nonprofit-corporate juggernaut. He’s building custom chips, launching an AI app store, and moving fast into hardware and enterprise services. Microsoft sees this as direct competition.

It’s a fraying marriage held together by mutual benefit, but barely.

Stakes: A real split could upend the entire enterprise AI ecosystem and open the door for rivals like Google, Meta, or Anthropic to swoop in. This relationship could end with another courtroom clash.

3. Sam Altman vs. Mark Zuckerberg

It’s the quietest war but maybe the most cutthroat. Meta has made AI its top priority for 2025 and Zuckerberg is going straight for Altman’s team.

In recent months, Meta has offered $100 million and more in signing bonuses to OpenAI researchers in a bid to poach top talent, Altman says. So far, most have stayed loyal to Altman. But the scale of the offers has shocked the Valley.

In a podcast with his brother, Altman didn’t mince words: “They started making these, like, giant offers to a lot of people on our team, you know, like $100 million signing bonuses,” Altman said, adding:”It is crazy.” He accused Meta of “just trying to copy OpenAI, down to the UI mistakes.”

Zuckerberg’s strategy is familiar. Outspend, out-recruit, outlast. Meta’s AI tools are still basic compared to ChatGPT, but with enough hires and acquisitions (like rumored talks with voice-AI startup PlayAI), Meta hopes to leapfrog the field.

Stakes: Zuckerberg is fighting not just for dominance in AI, but for relevance. If Meta fails to catch up, it could be left behind in a world where AI, not social media, is the next major computing platform.

New episode of Uncapped with @sama. Enjoy 🤗 pic.twitter.com/2IxYt3B4Gm

— Jack Altman (@jaltma) June 17, 2025

Our Take

The AI race has become a war of personalities. Altman, the techno-missionary. Musk, the chaos capitalist. Zuckerberg, the empire builder. Each believes they are the only one who can lead humanity into the next era of intelligence. What’s unfolding is a battle for the infrastructure of the 21st century: who owns the models, who trains the machines, and who gets to decide what AI thinks.

And if the lawsuits, subpoenas, and poaching wars are any indication, they’re willing to burn billions to win.