*Carlo Versano*
Saudi Arabia's interest in funding a buyout of Tesla shareholders is far from certain, said [Maureen Farrell](https://www.wsj.com/articles/larger-tesla-stake-by-giant-saudi-fund-faces-hurdles-1534239000) of the Wall Street Journal, and it's unclear if the kingdom's sovereign wealth fund would have the capital to secure such a deal for the electric carmaker's CEO, Elon Musk.
The Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia has made a handful of big bets on Silicon Valley ー most notably, a $3.5 billion [cash infusion](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/02/technology/uber-investment-saudi-arabia.html) in Uber in 2016.
"They've been very public about wanting to be a leader in tech," Farrell said Tuesday in an interview on Cheddar.
However, much of the capital earmarked for investment was predicated on the successful IPO of the state oil company, Saudi Aramco, which has stalled. Without the cash from the public offering ー as much as $100 billion for a 5 percent stake, according to [estimates](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-aramco-ipo/aramco-is-worlds-most-profitable-oil-company-bloomberg-idUSKBN1HK1RY) ー the sovereign wealth fund may not be inclined to finance a deal with Tesla, no matter what the royal family may have told Musk in the past.
"They've promised a lot of money to a lot of different people," Farrell said, including a planned mega-city to be built in the Saudi desert.
Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman has been vocal about his desire to diversify the country's investments from its oil and gas holdings. Elon Musk needs an investor of Salman's stature and wealth to help take Tesla private.
As it stands, Musk's vision for a zero-emissions future seems dependent on an investment arm built on an oil fortune.
A group of book authors has reached a settlement with AI company Anthropic after suing for copyright infringement. A federal appeals court filing Tuesday said both sides have negotiated a proposed class settlement, with terms to be finalized next week. Anthropic declined to comment. A lawyer for the authors called it a "historic settlement." In June, a federal judge ruled that Anthropic didn't break the law by training its chatbot on copyrighted books. However, the company was still facing trial over acquiring those books from online "shadow libraries" of pirated copies.
Elon Musk on Monday targeted Apple and OpenAI in an antitrust lawsuit alleging that the iPhone maker and the ChatGPT maker are teaming up to thwart competition in artificial intelligence.
Elon Musk’s X has reached a tentative settlement with former employees of the company then known as Twitter who’d sued for $500 million in severance pay.
Small-scale solar panels about the size of a door are poised to be plugged into more U.S. homes and apartments as homeowners and renters who want to harness the sun’s energy look for cheaper alternatives to rooftop installations.
Rebecca Bellan, Senior Reporter at TechCrunch, dives into ChatGPT’s GPT‑5 release—what’s new, what’s controversial, and why this model could change the game.
Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan says he’s “always operated within the highest legal and ethical standards” after coming under pressure following President Donald Trump’s call for him to resign.
