Apple withdraws from OpenAI funding negotiations

The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Apple had withdrawn from negotiations to join in an OpenAI investment round estimated to garner approximately $6.5 billion.

According to the publication, the tech giant recently dropped out of talks for the round, which is slated to close next week.

Other companies, including Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), have been in talks to participate, according to the source, with Microsoft anticipated to pay around $1 billion after already investing $13 billion in the company.

OpenAI declined to comment, while Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Last month, the Journal reported that Apple was in talks as part of OpenAI's current fundraising push, which could value the ChatGPT creator at more than $100 billion.

The high valuation stems from the AI arms race ignited by OpenAI's debut of ChatGPT in late 2022, which prompted corporations across industries to invest billions of dollars in the technology in order to remain ahead of the competition and win market dominance.