Musk had sought the ouster of Sam Altman, along with other changes to OpenAI. The AP report said the case became a referendum not only on what the companies and their leaders intended for OpenAI, but also on what the jury’s decision would cover once the question turned procedural rather than substantive.

The jurors determined that Musk waited too long to file his lawsuit and missed a statutory deadline. In testimony and evidence presented during the trial, both sides sought to frame the central dispute in terms of whether OpenAI was drifting from its nonprofit mission, even as the jury’s decision ultimately rested on timeliness.

In the days after the verdict, Musk said he would appeal. He also criticized the judge who oversaw the case, Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, writing on X that she was a “terrible activist Oakland judge, who simply used the jury as a fig leaf” to create a bad precedent and adding, “She just handed out a free license to loot charities if you can keep the looting quiet for a few years!” The AP report said this was Musk’s second major courtroom loss in less than two months.

Judge Gonzalez Rogers, according to the AP report, made clear early that she did not want the trial to become a debate over the dangers of artificial intelligence. Still, unresolved questions about AI’s risks—such as job losses, mental health effects, and the possibility of humanity’s extinction—formed part of the wider backdrop as protesters regularly appeared outside the federal courthouse.

Outside the courtroom, demonstrations framed the controversy as a struggle between ordinary people and powerful technology executives who could not get along. Columbia Law School professor Dorothy Lund, speaking to the AP, said the trial was “a funny microcosm of this moment where we have this hugely important technology that’s being developed by for-profit corporations run by people like Musk and Altman and not as the part of some government-led initiative.”

During the trial, the AP report said prosecutors and witnesses offered a view into internal tensions at OpenAI, including presentations of emails, diary entries, and text-message exchanges. The report said some of those texts and communications involving Altman and a former OpenAI executive became meme fodder, including material that was turned into parody songs.

Testimony also touched on Altman’s removal from the OpenAI board in 2023, before he returned a few days later, the AP report said. Several witnesses, including two ex-board members, Helen Toner and Tasha McCauley, told the court there were concerns about Altman’s truthfulness.

The AP report said OpenAI responded to Musk’s allegations of betrayal by portraying them as an unfounded effort fueled by “sour grapes,” with Musk aiming to undermine OpenAI’s growth and strengthen his own AI company, xAI, which is now part of SpaceX. Musk, for his part, accused OpenAI, Altman and Greg Brockman of betraying a shared vision for OpenAI to remain a nonprofit guiding AI development for the good of humanity.

The AP report also quoted Sarah Kreps, director of Cornell University’s Tech Policy Institute, describing the trial as a window into how the future of AI still depends on “a remarkably small group of powerful tech figures and their personal rivalries.” Kreps also said the trial showed “not just a dispute between Musk and Altman, but a broader disconnect between the people building these systems and many of the people increasingly expected to live and work alongside them.”

Looking beyond the immediate verdict, University of Richmond Law School professor Carl Tobias told the AP that the “dirty laundry” shown in court “doesn’t look very appealing,” and that it could have “downstream effects” on reputations and business consequences, even if AI progress might continue regardless of any single company’s fortunes. He said, “AI is likely to come forward and continue even if it isn’t OpenAI,” while noting that multiple major tech players—including Musk’s SpaceX and OpenAI, and Anthropic—were planning large initial public offerings.