Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, at the Hope Global Forums annual meeting in Atlanta on Dec. 11, 2023.
Dustin Chambers | Bloomberg | Getty Images
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is seeking trillions of dollars in investments to overhaul the global semiconductor industry, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Altman has long talked of the supply-and-demand problem with AI chips — many AI giants want them, but there aren’t enough to go around — and that it limits OpenAI’s growth. He’s considering a project that would increase global chip-building capacity, according to a Thursday evening report in The Wall Street Journal, and is reportedly in talks with different investors, including the government of the United Arab Emirates.
Altman could need to raise between $5 trillion and $7 trillion for the endeavor, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing one source. CNBC could not confirm the number. OpenAI did not respond to a request for comment.
On Wednesday, Altman posted on X that OpenAI believes “the world needs more ai infrastructure–fab capacity, energy, datacenters, etc–than people are currently planning to build.” He added that “building massive-scale AI infrastructure, and a resilient supply chain, is crucial to economic competitiveness” and that OpenAI would try to help.
The news follows some controversy over some of Altman’s previous chip endeavors and investments.
Just before Altman’s brief ouster as CEO of OpenAI, he was reportedly seeking billions for a new and not-yet-formed chip venture code-named “Tigris” to eventually compete with Nvidia, traveling to the Middle East to raise money from investors.
In 2018, Altman personally invested in an AI chip startup called Rain Neuromorphics, based near OpenAI’s San Francisco headquarters, and in 2019, OpenAI signed a letter of intent to spend $51 million on Rain’s chips. In December, the U.S. compelled a Saudi Aramco-backed venture capital firm to sell its shares in Rain.
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