Author of this article: Li Dan.

The weather is good today The weather is good today.

When people mention the "backer" behind OpenAI, the first name that comes to mind is Microsoft. Who would have thought that seven years ago, Intel had a chance to invest in OpenAI, but this veteran chip giant missed the opportunity to advance into the emerging field of artificial intelligence (AI).

On Wednesday, August 7th, Eastern Time, the media quoted insiders as saying that about seven years ago, Intel had the opportunity to acquire a stake in OpenAI. At that time, OpenAI was just a newly established non-profit research institution, dedicated to the generation of AI, which was still relatively unknown at that time.

Insiders said that in the months of 2017 and 2018, Intel and OpenAI executives discussed various possible options, including Intel buying 15% of OpenAI's shares for US$1 billion, or Intel selling hardware to OpenAI at cost price and getting another 15% of OpenAI shares, but Intel ultimately decided to abandon the deal. OpenAI was interested in Intel's investment because it would reduce OpenAI's dependence on Nvidia chips and allow OpenAI to build its own infrastructure.

Insiders revealed that the reason why Intel ultimately refused to invest in OpenAI was partly because the then-CEO of Intel, Bob Swan, believed that the generative AI model would not enter the market in the near future, so Intel's investment could not be returned in the short term. Another reason was that Intel's data center department did not want to produce products at cost price for OpenAI.

Intel's spokesperson, Swan himself, and OpenAI did not comment on the above news. Alexei Oreskovic, a senior reporter in the technology industry who has covered the technology industry for more than 20 years and is currently the editor of the technology industry at Fortune, commented that the report that Intel had refused to invest in OpenAI reminded him of Intel's refusal to supply processors for the iPhone, which led to Intel's missing the opportunity to shift to the mobile field. Surprisingly, Intel made the same mistake in the AI field.

Former Intel CEO Paul Otellini revealed in a media interview in 2020 that Intel refused to supply iPhone chips because, before the iPhone was launched, no one could predict the future of the iPhone. Apple's purchase price for iPhone chips was significantly lower than Intel's cost expectations.

Although it is already a hindsight whether the decisions were correct or not, if the news on Wednesday is true, Intel might have reached a cooperation agreement and got AI chip orders with OpenAI two years earlier than Microsoft did, instead of struggling to grab a piece of cake from Nvidia. In the grasping of the investment opportunity in OpenAI, there is indeed a stark contrast between Intel and Microsoft. The foresight of Microsoft's leadership is evident.

Public information shows that in July 2019, Microsoft invested $1 billion in OpenAI, and in 2021 it added another $2 billion in investment. After OpenAI became famous due to its chatbot ChatGPT in December 2022, Microsoft further invested $10 billion in January last year.

An internal email from Microsoft in 2019, exposed at the end of April this year, showed that Kevin Scott, Microsoft's chief technology officer and AI executive vice president, warned Bill Gates and Microsoft CEO Nadella that Google had already taken a lead in AI and that if Microsoft didn't invest in OpenAI, it might never catch up. A few weeks after sending that email, Microsoft announced its $1 billion investment in OpenAI.

Wall Street News once mentioned that as a traditional technology giant, Microsoft, through a meager investment of only $13 billion, had deeply bound itself to both the technology and ownership of the most promising and powerful AI startups, and integrated the most advanced AI technology into almost all of its products in five years, easily taking the lead in the era and gaining a dominant position. This operation is enough to be included in the textbook of corporate transformation.