Microsoft Spent $100 Billion on OpenAI, Then Built Rival AI Models and Partnerships
Updated
Updated · CNBC · May 13
Microsoft Spent $100 Billion on OpenAI, Then Built Rival AI Models and Partnerships
7 articles · Updated · CNBC · May 13
$100 billion: Microsoft told court it will have spent more than that on OpenAI by June 2026, even as it shifted to build in-house AI models and back rivals including Anthropic and xAI.
2022 emails showed Satya Nadella feared Microsoft could become “IBM” to OpenAI’s “Microsoft,” pushing the company to secure IP rights and gain “agency at every layer of the stack.”
That edge has weakened as OpenAI reached an $850 billion valuation and expanded ties with Google, Oracle and Amazon; an April contract revamp let it serve products across any cloud provider.
OpenAI still anchors Microsoft’s AI economics: about 45% of commercial remaining performance obligations were tied to it at the end of 2025, helping drive Azure growth and data-center spending.
Microsoft has since treated OpenAI as both partner and competitor, hiring Mustafa Suleyman, testing homegrown models for Copilot and broadening its AI strategy after its stock fell 16% this year.
With OpenAI now free to partner with rivals, is Microsoft's $100 billion bet becoming a strategic liability?
As courtroom drama exposes rifts between AI's founders, can they be trusted to safely steer the future of AGI?
With AI enabling nation-state level hacking, is the tech industry's rivalry distracting from a catastrophic cybersecurity threat?
The $100 Billion Microsoft-OpenAI Partnership: Financial Stakes, Strategic Diversification, and the AI Infrastructure Race
Overview
Since 2019, Microsoft and OpenAI have built one of the tech sector’s most important partnerships, starting as a research collaboration and evolving through major investments and deep technical integration. Their relationship has matured, with a new agreement in April 2026 to simplify collaboration as both companies adapt to the fast-changing AI landscape. This evolution is driven by huge computational needs, the desire to avoid relying on a single vendor, and growing regulatory scrutiny. Together, these factors have shaped a dynamic alliance that continues to influence the direction of artificial intelligence and the broader technology industry.