Elon Musk Allegedly Asked to be Apple’s CEO When Tim Cook Asked to Buy Tesla

A new story has surfaced that involves Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Apple CEO Tim Cook. The story is courtesy of “Power Play: Tesla, Elon Musk and the Bet of the Century” by Wall Street Journal reporter Tim Higgins.

It is set in 2016 and sees Tesla struggling financially. A call happens between Musk and Cook where the latter offers to buy Tesla. Sure, responds the former but on one condition, Musk gets to be CEO. Cook agrees and that's when Musk clarifies he wants to be CEO of Apple, not just Tesla.

"F**k you," Cook allegedly says and hangs up.

The story has been making the rounds on different media channels including Gizmodo and the LA Times, but no one knows whether it is actually true.

In late 2020, Musk actually tweeted, “During the darkest days of the Model 3 program, I reached out to Tim Cook to discuss the possibility of Apple acquiring Tesla (for 1/10 of our current value). He refused to take the meeting.”

This would imply that the two famed CEOs could have never had the above-mentioned conversation but the plot thickens as Musk also tweeted  “Cook & I have never spoken or written to each other ever," contradicting his previous story.

So what does Higgins, the man who brought us this juicy tidbit of gossip, have to say about all this? 

Higgins took to Twitter to issue his statement: "Musk was given plenty of opportunities to comment on this. He didn’t. This anecdote comes from Musk’s own account of the conversation, according to people who heard the retelling at the time."

However, Musk did tweet that “Higgins managed to make his book both false *and* boring" which could be a denial of some sort. In the end, only Musk and Cook will ever know for sure whether that story was true or cooked up by an overzealous reporter. Unless, of course, they decide to issue formal statements on that matter. 

Sadly, that seems pretty unlikely.