Elon Musk to start AI rival in challenge to OpenAI
Dimitrios Kambouris
Between running Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), overhauling Twitter (TWTR) and launching an occasional SpaceX rocket, Elon Musk would appear to have more than enough on his plate to keep him busy.
But, it seems like he has room for just one more thing: Artificial Intelligence.
The iconic tech billionaire is planning to launch an AI startup with a directive to rival the ChatGPT technology from OpenAI, and is said to be building up a team of engineers and researchers to get the project off the ground. And according to the Financial Times, Musk is not just talking about making his AI enterprise a reality.
The FT said that "people familiar with the tech entrepreneur's plans" said Musk has already bought up "thousands" of Nvidia's (NVDA) high-powered graphics processors [GPUs] to build a large language model that will be capable of running massive amounts of data to create content on the level of ChatGPT. 
According to the FT, the engineers Musk has hired include several from DeepMind, a British AI research lab that was founded in 2010, and which now is a subsidiary of Google's parent company Alphabet (GOOG).
There is a possibility that the chance to take on OpenAI could also be personal for Musk, as co-founded that company in 2015, and left its board of directors in 2018 due to differences in strategy with OpenAI executives.
ChatGPT has taken center stage in the booming interest in AI over the last several months since Microsoft (MSFT) threw its weight behind OpenAI in January with a "multi-year, multi-billion dollar investment" in the company.