NEW DELHI, FEB 19 : With Prime Minister Narendra Modi on stage, AI\u2019s long-running rivalry between OpenAI\u2019s Sam Altman and Anthropic\u2019s Dario Amodei was once again laid bare when the two tech leaders hesitated to hold hands at Delhi\u2019s Bharat Mandapam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As PM Modi looked on, the two rivals, standing next to each other, appeared uncomfortable. At the Prime Minister\u2019s request — along with other prominent leaders on stage — they seemed reluctant to join hands. Eventually, instead of making a show of unity, the two raised their fists, breaking the chain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like a picture that speaks a thousand words, this still captured the moment as PM Modi seeks to position India as a key voice in the AI world. It underscored that the realities shaping the AI landscape are far more complex than simply having global leaders share the same stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Altman and Amodei could have stood side by side, but their decision not to play to the gallery by holding hands reflected how deeply divided and fragmented the AI world currently is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At its core, this is a clash between two AI titans — ideologically at odds. The roots of the divide trace back to the founding of Anthropic, when Dario and Daniela Amodei, both former OpenAI vice-presidents, left their then-boss Altman over concerns that the company was prioritising commercialisation over safety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Against this backdrop, Dario laid the foundation for a safety-first approach at the heart of his company, setting him on a course opposite to that of his former boss. Altman\u2019s company, OpenAI, on the other hand, has kept a close watch on its former employee — now its biggest competitor — and has not shied away from criticising it at the drop of a hat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The wounds from their latest battle are still fresh. At the start of February, Altman and Amodei took fresh swipes at each other after Anthropic aired a Super Bowl campaign in the US that appeared to mock OpenAI\u2019s move to introduce ads in ChatGPT. Altman, who believes in democratising technology rather than keeping it behind paywalls, did not take the jibe kindly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Anthropic serves an expensive product to rich people,” Altman shot back on X. “We are glad they do that, and we are doing that too, but we also feel strongly that we need to bring AI to billions of people who can\u2019t pay for subscriptions,” he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
OpenAI, on the other hand, believes that in order to bring affordable AI to everyone\u2019s doorstep, it must aggressively commercialise its products and generate significant advertising revenue to sustain its vision of democratisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, the battle between the two is not just about market share or ideology. It is also about product.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Both have been in the game long enough to know that the better the product, the easier the battle. In this arena as well, the rivalry was evident, with both releasing their flagship coding tools just 20 minutes apart. While Anthropic launched Claude Opus 4.6, OpenAI quickly followed with GPT-5.3 Codex. Altman described the coding agent as capable of doing \u201canything\u201d a human developer can do within a system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
All it took for the two worlds to clash again was the AI Impact Summit stage at Bharat Mandapam. The refusal to hold hands was not comical; it appeared deliberate, weighed down by past baggage that has split the AI world into two camps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
-PTI<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" NEW DELHI, FEB 19 : With Prime Minister Narendra Modi on stage, AI\u2019s long-running rivalry between OpenAI\u2019s Sam Altman and Anthropic\u2019s Dario Amodei was once again laid bare when the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":148775,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[348],"tags":[28234,28233,63,7244],"class_list":["post-148774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national-news","tag-anthropics-dario-amodei-skip-unity-hand-raise","tag-awkward-openais-sam-altman","tag-new-delhi","tag-prime-minister-modi"],"yoast_head":"\n