MICROSOFT SAYS IT WAS CONTRACTUALLY TRAPPED WITH OPENAI UNTIL SIX MONTHS AGO — NOW IT IS BUILDING SUPERINTELLIGENCE ALONE For years, Microsoft was OpenAI’s biggest backer and most visible beneficiary. Those terms have changed. At Microsoft Build, Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI, disclosed that a series of contract amendments beginning in October 2025 formally freed the company to pursue superintelligence using its own researchers, data pipelines, and custom silicon. The language Suleyman used was precise and pointed: “We were only sort of set free from our contract with OpenAI about six months ago to formally pursue superintelligence.” That is not a small admission. For most of the AI era, Microsoft’s billions in OpenAI investment came with an implicit arrangement: Microsoft provided compute and capital, OpenAI provided the models. The new agreement dissolves that division. Microsoft can now build frontier AI systems independently, without OpenAI’s involvement or approval. Suleyman leads the MAI Superintelligence Team and has been building quietly while the company’s partnership with OpenAI remained the public face of Microsoft’s AI strategy. Microsoft’s own reasoning model, announced this week as built from scratch with no OpenAI involvement, is the clearest evidence yet that the shift is already underway and has been for some time. The companies have not parted ways. The investment relationship continues. But what started as a partnership is now something closer to competition, and Microsoft just made it official. That the announcement came at Build rather than in a press release speaks to how confident Suleyman is that the market is ready to hear it. Keywords: Microsoft superintelligence, Microsoft OpenAI split, Mustafa Suleyman Microsoft AI, Microsoft AI independence