Paul Morris on August 1, 2021, 2:34 am

Elon Musk Reportedly Demanded To Become Apple CEO As Part Of Tesla Acquisition Deal, Musk Denies It

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has used Twitter to deny reports in a recently published book that he once demanded to become CEO of Apple Inc. as part of any deal to acquire Tesla.

The claim within the book, titled “Power Play: Tesla, Elon Musk and the Bet of the Century,” has been branded “false and boring” by the Tesla CEO.

It isn’t a secret that the current Tesla CEO had once attempted to reach out to Apple CEO Tim Cook to discuss a potential buyout for Tesla. In fact, Musk himself has actually confirmed this via social media in the past.

However, this new book claims that things went a step further and that Cook had offered to buy Tesla to remove it from the financial trouble that it found itself in at that time.

The book then claims that Musk was interested in the deal but informed Tim Cook that he would replace him as the CEO of Apple Inc. as part of the deal. Cook replied with a “f— you” and hung up, according to the book. This purported interaction between two of the world’s biggest CEOs has generated a lot of interest and traction on social media over the last 24-hours but Musk has now confirmed that it simply didn’t happen as stipulated in the book.

As an initial retort, Elon Musk called the report “false and boring” but went a little further when pushed on the topic, claiming that he and Apple CEO Tim Cook have never spoken and the Apple CEO had previously refused to even meet him:

Cook & I have never spoken or written to each other ever.

There was a point where I requested to meet with Cook to talk about Apple buying Tesla. There were no conditions of acquisition proposed whatsoever.

He refused to meet. Tesla was worth about 6% of today’s value.

So, there you have it! Not everything that you read in published non-fiction books is true. Or, not everything you read on Twitter from erratic global CEOs is true. One or the other. What would Apple look like today if Musk had taken over as CEO? The company would use less cobalt in its batteries, that’s for sure.