In a post on X titled “A tale in three acts,” Altman shared a screenshot of a July 2018 email confirming his $45,000 deposit for a second-generation Tesla Roadster. Alongside it, he posted a follow-up email sent this week asking to cancel the order and get a $50,000 refund, only for the message to bounce back.
“I really was excited for the car! And I understand delays. But 7.5 years has felt like a long time to wait,” Altman said in a follow-up post, clearly taking a swipe at Musk’s ability to deliver anything that isn’t another tweet.
Neither Altman nor Tesla’s press team bothered to respond to Business Insider’s calls, which is probably just as well given the state of the Roadster project.
Musk’s 2017 unveiling of the new Roadster was pure showmanship. He boasted that it “will be the fastest production car ever made, period.” It was meant to break two seconds from 0–60mph and hit 100mph in 4.2 seconds. The production date was set for 2020, which, like most of Musk’s timelines, was missed by several light years.
During an earnings call in October 2024, Musk told investors Tesla was “finalising the design” of the Roadster but insisted the company’s priority was its “sustainable energy future.”
He added: “We are working on it, but it has to come behind things that have a more serious impact on the world. So, just thank you to all our long-suffering Tesla Roadster deposit holders.”
At the time of writing, neither Musk nor Tesla had responded to Altman’s refund request, suggesting that his bounced email might be the most direct answer he’ll get.
The timing isn’t accidental. Altman’s public jab comes as part of his ongoing spat with Musk, the man who once helped him found OpenAI back in 2015 before storming off the board three years later.
Since then, Musk has accused Altman of turning OpenAI into a for-profit cash machine for Microsoft. In February 2024, he sued Altman and OpenAI for allegedly betraying the outfit’s nonprofit mission, withdrew the suit in June, and then refiled it in August, because of course he did.
By November, Musk’s lawyers were trying to block OpenAI’s restructuring into a public benefit company. A spokesperson for OpenAI dismissed the injunction as “utterly without merit.”
Altman later told former Fox News presenter Tucker Carlson,“For a long time, I looked up to [Musk] as an incredible hero, a great jewel for humanity. I have different feelings now.”
He added, *“There are things about him that are incredible, and I’m grateful for a lot of things he’s done. There’s a lot of things about him that I think are traits I don’t admire.”
Earlier this week, OpenAI announced it had completed its long-awaited restructure, with its nonprofit arm, the OpenAI Foundation, now overseeing the new public benefit corporation, OpenAI Group PBC.
