Elon Musk’s legal challenge against OpenAI has been rejected by a California jury, marking a major victory for the ChatGPT maker and its chief executive, Sam Altman, in a dispute over the company’s founding mission.
Jurors in Oakland reached a unanimous verdict after about two hours of deliberations, finding that Musk had waited too long to bring his claims. The decision meant they did not have to rule on whether OpenAI had improperly moved away from its original non-profit purpose.
Musk, who helped launch OpenAI in 2015 before leaving three years later, had accused Altman and the company of betraying the organisation’s early promise to develop artificial intelligence for the benefit of humanity. He said he had donated $38 million in OpenAI’s early years on the understanding that it would remain committed to that charitable mission.
The case also involved Microsoft, OpenAI’s biggest corporate partner, which Musk accused of helping the company shift towards a more commercial structure. Those claims were dismissed following the jury’s findings against Musk’s central allegations.
“The facts and the timeline in this case have long been clear,” a spokesperson for Microsoft said of the verdict.
The company added that it remained committed to its work with OpenAI.
The trial offered a rare public account of the breakdown between Musk and Altman, whose rivalry has intensified since the global success of ChatGPT. Musk has repeatedly criticised OpenAI’s business model, while the company has argued that his claims misrepresent its history.
During the trial, Musk told jurors that the case was about protecting charitable giving.
“It’s actually very simple,” he said. “It’s not OK to steal a charity… If it’s okay to loot a charity, the entire foundation of charitable giving will be destroyed.”
Altman disputed Musk’s account, telling the court that Musk had supported OpenAI becoming more commercially structured and had sought long-term control of the organisation.
“A particularly hair-raising moment was when my co-founders asked, ‘If you have control, what happens when you die?'” Altman recalled in court. “He said something like, ‘maybe it should pass to my children.'”
After the verdict, Musk criticised the outcome on X, calling it “a free license to loot charities if you can keep the looting quiet for a few years!” He also said he would appeal, describing the ruling as based on a “calendar technicality” rather than “on the merits of the case.”
OpenAI welcomed the decision. Its spokesman, Sam Singer, called the verdict a “tremendous victory” and said, “This was nothing but an effort by Mr Musk to slow down a competitor.”
Musk’s lawyer, Marc Toberoff, said outside court, “This war is not over, and I’d sum it up in one word: appeal.”