Elon Musk filed a new lawsuit against OpenAI and two of its founders, Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, arguing that the company departed from its original purpose of benefiting the public rather than pursuing profits. The complaint was filed in a Northern California federal court and renews Musk’s broader dispute with OpenAI over what he says were the company’s founding commitments.
Musk’s lawsuit characterizes his case as a “textbook tale of altruism versus greed,” according to the complaint. It alleges that Altman and others “intentionally courted and deceived Musk,” and it ties that conduct to Musk’s concerns about “the existential dangers posed by artificial intelligence,” as described in the filing.
In court filings summarized in the complaint and reported by The Associated Press, Musk portrayed himself as an early investor in OpenAI after it was founded in 2015. Musk said he invested “tens of millions” of dollars and recruited top AI research scientists for the company.
The suit also revisits Musk’s departure from OpenAI leadership. Musk resigned from the board in early 2018, and OpenAI said at the time that the resignation was meant to prevent conflicts of interest as Musk was recruiting AI talent for Tesla, including work aimed at self-driving technology.
The renewed lawsuit comes after Musk previously sued OpenAI and later dropped that earlier case in June without explanation. That earlier lawsuit alleged that when Musk funded OpenAI’s creation, he secured an agreement with Altman and Brockman to keep OpenAI as a nonprofit that would develop technology for the public good and keep its code open.
OpenAI rejected Musk’s renewed allegations through a spokesperson who said Musk’s earlier emails undercut his new position. The spokesperson said, “As we said about Elon’s initial legal filing, which was subsequently withdrawn, Elon’s prior emails continue to speak for themselves,” according to an emailed statement reported by AP. The statement also referenced emails OpenAI released in March that Musk had earlier supported making OpenAI a for-profit company.
Musk’s complaint argues that OpenAI’s namesake objective was “betrayed by Altman and his accomplices,” according to AP’s account of the filing. The complaint also includes a description of what it calls the dispute’s moral stakes, saying, “The perfidy and deceit are of Shakespearean proportions,” a line attributed to the complaint in AP’s reporting.
In a dispute centered on OpenAI’s nonprofit origins and the company’s evolution, the filing renews allegations tied to Musk’s role as both an early investor and a former board co-chair. With OpenAI and the individuals named in the complaint contesting Musk’s depiction of their actions, the case sets up another round of legal wrangling over what OpenAI was intended to do at the start and what it became later.