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ANALYSIS

The country’s most notorious billionaire rivals sat together at Trump’s inauguration

For years, the biggest tech giants have battled amongst themselves (remember when Zuckberg and Musk were going to have a cage match?). Now they are coming together in support of the president — and their own interests, writes Io Dodds

Wednesday 15 January 2025 14:41 GMT
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Jeff Bezos arrives with partner Lauren Sanchez for Donald Trump’s inauguration

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On Monday the three richest people on Earth squeezed into an area together smaller than a Mini Cooper.

“First buddy” Elon Musk, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Facebook and Instagram boss Mark Zuckerberg sat together — along with Google CEO Sundar Pichai, himself a billionaire but only barely — during Donald Trump’s inauguration in Washington D.C.

In a show of power, they sat directly behind Trump’s family.

CEO of Meta Mark Zuckerberg, Lauren Sanchez, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk attend the inauguration
CEO of Meta Mark Zuckerberg, Lauren Sanchez, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk attend the inauguration (POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Musk, Bezos and Zuckerberg enjoy a combined estimated net worth of $860bn but are far from best friends. Often they’ve openly feuded, on both a business and personal level.

But authoritarian leaders tend to make strange bedfellows, and in recent months all three men have bent the knee to Trump.

Take Musk and Bezos, who have spent years locked in a private space race against each other. Their respective companies, SpaceX and Blue Origin, have long tussled over federal space launch contracts.

The two men reportedly clashed as early as 2004, when they met over dinner to discuss the space industry. “[I told him,] ‘Dude, we tried that and that turned out to be really dumb, so don’t do the dumb thing we did’,” Musk later recalled. “I actually did my best to give good advice, which he largely ignored.”

In 2013 Blue Origin sued to prevent SpaceX from using one of NASA’s launchpads, which Musk described as a “phony blocking tactic”.

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk looks upward as he sits during the inauguration
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk looks upward as he sits during the inauguration (POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

The rivalry heated up further in 2019, as both men continued to needle each other in public statements and on social media. Bezos mocked Musk’s desire to colonize Mars, while Musk called Bezos a “copycat” over his plans for a network of low earth orbit satellites (similar to Musk’s Starlink).

The two companies continued to battle in court, while Musk accused Bezos of “taking himself a bit too seriously” and criticized Amazon’s Lord of the Rings TV series for being sexist against men.

Zuckerberg has been in a public spat with Musk which nearly turned into a cage fight
Zuckerberg has been in a public spat with Musk which nearly turned into a cage fight (AP)

Then there’s Musk’s long and bizarre public quarrel with Meta boss Zuckerberg. After a faulty SpaceX rocket blew up one of Facebook’s satellites on the launchpad in 2016, Zuckerberg called Musk’s “naysaying” views on AI “irresponsible”.

In 2018, Musk joined the #DeleteFacebook trend and closed his companies’ Facebook accounts, quipping: “What’s Facebook?”

Things got weirder in 2023, after Musk got into the social media market by buying Twitter and renaming it X. Harsh words over Facebook’s trustworthiness, and Instagram’s attempt to poach users from X, escalated into a planned mixed martial arts cage match between the two men.

“Zuck is a cuck,” tweeted Musk, offering to engage in a “literal dick-measuring contest”. Thankfully for the world, this never happened, and neither did the cage match (for which both men blamed each other).

Meta and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Google Sundar Pichai, CEO of Apple Tim Cook, founder of Amazon and Blue Origin Jeff Bezos attend inauguration church services
Meta and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Google Sundar Pichai, CEO of Apple Tim Cook, founder of Amazon and Blue Origin Jeff Bezos attend inauguration church services (Getty Images)

Yet business is business, and all three men now seem to have calculated that schmoozing Trump benefits theirs.

Bezos intervened with the Washington Post (the newspaper he owns) to spike a planned election endorsement of Kamala Harris, although he insisted this had nothing to do with Trump. He later donated $1m to Trump's inauguration fund and visited him at Mar-a-Lago.

Zuckerberg, meanwhile, has unveiled a raft of Trump-friendly reforms at his company, Meta, and appointed a Trump ally to his board. Having spent 2020 selling himself as a heartfelt progressive, he then went on Joe Rogan to extol the “masculine energy” at his company, Meta (which is 63 per cent staffed by women). Both Amazon and Meta have also said they will axe diversity programs.

Elon Musk was on the campaign trail with Trump — and has turned into one of his closest allies
Elon Musk was on the campaign trail with Trump — and has turned into one of his closest allies (Associated Press)

Musk’s MAGA transformation, of course, is well known — as are his massive financial donations to Trump’s campaign and his influence over the coming White House. During the inauguration, he moved to stand with Trump’s family.

Musk stands near Barron Trump and Don Trump Jr during the inauguration
Musk stands near Barron Trump and Don Trump Jr during the inauguration (POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

On Monday, Zuckerberg, Bezos and Musk, along with Alphabet’s Pichai and Apple CEO Tim Cook all went to the inauguration church services in D.C. with Trump shortly before he was sworn in as president.

Cook, who Trump once called “Tim Apple”, has kept some distance from Trump until recently. Cook, who is gay, has personally donated to Trump's inauguration and devoted great effort to improving his relationship with Trump, but his company has defended its diversity policies against a conservative challenge. And yet, he made sure to be there on Monday.

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, left, and Elon Musk check their phones
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, left, and Elon Musk check their phones (Getty Images)

These tech baron billionaires sat united in little but the sprawling scale of their business interests and their shared willingness to pay obeisance to a man described by 14 of his own former officials as a power-hungry fascist.

I can’t help wondering if seating them together is a deliberate piece of theater by the always loyalty-conscious Trump (or rather, one of his aides) — to show off to the world that, in particular, these powerful men are willing to put aside their differences for this shared interest.

Still, wouldn't you love to be the federal agent assigned to eavesdrop on their conversation?

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