May 18, 2026, 8:05 p.mMay 18, 2026, 8:38 p.m
Why the elongated face? Musk at a court hearing in March. (archive image)Image: keystone
Elon Musk has lost his lawsuit against the AI company OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman in a California court. A jury unanimously dismissed the lawsuit on Monday because they believed Musk had filed it after a statute of limitations had expired. The judge ruled accordingly.
Among other things, Musk wanted to ensure that OpenAI boss Sam Altman and top manager Greg Brockman lost their positions and that the structure of the AI developer was changed.
The tech billionaire, an early backer of OpenAI, accused Altman and Brockman of “stealing from a charity.” This accusation was central to the trial that lasted several weeks in Oakland, California.
As part of the trial, the jury spent three weeks examining internal company correspondence and listening to witness statements. After two hours of consultation, they finally came to their decision on Monday.
OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit company in 2015 by several tech giants – including Altman and Musk. The latter left the organization in 2018 and stopped his support completely in 2020.
There was a lot at stake for OpenAI
A success for Musk could have set OpenAI back in terms of financing and thus revolutionized competition in the booming AI industry. With around 700 million users per week, ChatGPT is a leading player, while Musk’s competing software Grok is less popular.
According to calculations by the industry service “The Information”, almost 90 percent of the AI industry’s revenues currently go to OpenAI and its rival Anthropic. Anthropic is slightly ahead.
Musk was an important backer of OpenAI in its early days. In total, he contributed around $38 million in financing. By mid-2017, he supported the AI development with around $25 million in quarterly payments and took over the rent for a good $12 million by 2020. There were also four vehicles from the electric car manufacturer Tesla, which he runs, for top employees.
(cpf, supplemented with material from sda)