Mark Zuckerberg has been poaching researchers away from OpenAI for Meta’s own AI project, but at one point he was eyeing the entire company itself.
Private texts dated February 3, 2025, show Zuckerberg reaching out to Elon Musk, offering to suppress content on Meta platforms that was doxxing or threatening DOGE personnel — and then pivoting to business: “Are you open to the idea of bidding on the OpenAI IP with me and some others?” Musk reacted warmly to the first message, and Zuckerberg closed with “Want to discuss live?” The conversation was released as a part of the OpenAI vs Elon Musk lawsuit, and shared by Internal Tech Emails.
The emails add new texture to what court filings later confirmed. In August 2025, OpenAI revealed in federal court documents that Musk had identified Zuckerberg as someone he had communicated with about “potential financing arrangements or investments” as part of his unsolicited $97.4 billion bid to acquire OpenAI. Neither Zuckerberg nor Meta signed the letter of intent, and OpenAI’s board formally rejected the offer in February 2025.
The overture was striking given that the two men had spent years as public antagonists — culminating in a much-mocked 2023 cage-match challenge. But the emails suggest that beneath the theater, a deal was at least contemplated. Musk’s motivation for the bid was his opposition to OpenAI’s conversion from nonprofit to for-profit, a process he’d been fighting in court since 2024. OpenAI called his bid a “sham” designed to disrupt the company’s fundraising efforts; a judge allowed OpenAI’s counterclaims to proceed.
For Zuckerberg, the calculus would have been complicated. Meta has positioned itself as the open-source alternative to closed-model labs, and teaming with Musk on a hostile takeover of OpenAI would have sat awkwardly alongside that identity. Meta ultimately stayed out — and instead doubled down on its talent strategy, reportedly offering joining bonuses of up to $100 million to lure away OpenAI researchers. OpenAI’s subpoena of Meta, seeking communications related to the bid, remains contested in court, with Meta arguing the request is “overly burdensome” and that no relevant coordination ever took place.
And the latest emails show how hard Meta has been trying to catch up in the AI race. After releasing Llama and seeing initial success, its AI efforts have largely fallen by the wayside, requiring a complete overhaul with new faces and teams. And apart from having acquired companies like Manus and poaching top researchers, it appears that Meta also had its eye on the biggest prize in the AI space as well.