Elon Musk’s $134 Billion OpenAI Fight Heads to Trial
Elon Musk’s $134 billion lawsuit in opposition to OpenAI, Sam Altman, and Microsoft goes to trial Monday in federal courtroom in Oakland, California, after the billionaire dropped his fraud claims days earlier than jury choice.
US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers permitted Musk’s request Friday to slender the case from 26 unique claims down to two surviving counts of unjust enrichment and breach of charitable belief.
A Trial Years within the Making
Musk filed swimsuit in November 2024 after donating roughly $38 million in seed funding to OpenAI. It launched as a nonprofit analysis lab in 2015.
He alleges Altman and co-founder Greg Brockman induced that backing with specific guarantees that the group would by no means pursue business revenue.
OpenAI later restructured right into a capped-profit entity and accepted greater than $13 billion from Microsoft. The shift, Musk argues, enriched insiders on the expense of early donors and the general public mission they had been advised they had been funding.
In February 2025, Musk led a $97.4 billion consortium bid to take control of OpenAI’s nonprofit arm. Altman rejected the provide publicly.
What the Jury Will Decide
The trial examines whether or not OpenAI and Microsoft had been unjustly enriched by the corporate’s shift to a for-profit mannequin. It additionally focuses on whether or not OpenAI breached the phrases of its unique charitable mission. The second declare accuses Microsoft of aiding and abetting.
If Elon Musk prevails, his attorneys have requested that any damages circulate to OpenAI’s charitable arm reasonably than to him personally.
Musk is individually pursuing an antitrust case in opposition to Apple and OpenAI and continues to develop xAI as a direct rival to Altman’s company.
Jury choice begins Monday morning earlier than Judge Gonzalez Rogers, who beforehand presided over the Epic Games antitrust case in opposition to Apple. The proceedings are anticipated to expose inner communications between Musk, Altman, and Brockman from OpenAI’s earliest years.
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