Musk vs OpenAI: Jury Ends Silicon Valley’s Biggest AI Battle

A US jury has ruled against Elon Musk in his lawsuit against OpenAI. The jury said the world’s richest person took too long to sue OpenAI and its co-founders, delivering a decisive victory to the ChatGPT startup and ending one of Silicon Valley’s most closely watched courtroom battles.

Musk argued that OpenAI’s motive of a profit-driven business betrayed its original nonprofit mandate.

The jury in Oakland federal court found that Musk’s claims against OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, President Greg Brockman, The OpenAI Foundation and Microsoft were barred by statutes of limitations, rejecting the billionaire’s core arguments. The trial was seen as a critical moment for the future of OpenAI and AI in general, both on how it should be used and who should benefit from it.

The verdict spared OpenAI from a potentially existential legal threat.

Musk was a co-founder of OpenAI, launched in 2015. Elon invested $3.8 mn in OpenAI in its first years, but in 2024, he accused OpenAI CEO Sam Altman of shifting into a moneymaking mode, keeping him in the dark. The trial began on April 27. If Musk would have secured the verdict in his favour, OpenAI’s IPO plans would have been derailed.

Altman and OpenAI said they was no promise to keep OpenAI a non-profit forever. They claimed Musk too was aware of it but filed the lawsuit because he could not have unilateral control over the AI startup.

The jury observed that Musk, who filed a suit in 2024, took four years after his last contribution, which is beyond the statutory time limit.