In a surprising turn of events, Satya Nadella’s Micrsoft has officially labelled Sam Altman’s OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, as a “competitor” in a recent United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing.

This marks a shift in Microsoft’s long-standing partnership with OpenAI, in which the software giant had previously invested a substantial $13 billion and served as the exclusive cloud provider for the AI tech firm, TechCrunch reported.

Notably, OpenAI’s models have been integrated into Microsoft’s enterprise and consumer products as part of this collaboration.

In Microsoft’s annual 10K filing, OpenAI found itself among a list of competitors in the field of AI, including Anthropic, Amazon, and Meta.

Moreover, OpenAI was also mentioned alongside Google as a competitor to Microsoft in the arena of search, particularly following the announcement of OpenAI’s new SearchGPT feature.

This may reflect Microsoft’s response to growing antitrust concerns, with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) currently looking into the dynamics of tech giant partnerships with AI startups.

Microsoft recently agreed to relinquish its board observer seat at OpenAI, which it gained after a brief firing of Altman.

However, SEC filings like this are often places where corporations throw out hyper-cautious warnings to investors.

Furthermore, in March, Microsoft hired the co-founders of billion-dollar AI startup Inflection AI, Mustafa Suleyman and Karén Simonyan, to lead its new Microsoft AI division.

The cloud provider is investing heavily into Microsoft Copilot and building out an AI future that’s entirely separate from OpenAI.