First came the UK, then the EU, and the U.S. shortly followed. Now it’s Elon Musk pushing for legal scrutiny of OpenAI.
Musk filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman late Thursday (Feb. 29), alleging the ChatGPT-maker’s partnership with Microsoft betrays its founding commitment to benefiting humanity over generating profit.
“OpenAI, Inc. has been transformed into a closed-source de facto subsidiary of the largest technology company in the world: Microsoft,” Musk’s suit says. “Under its new board, it is not just developing but is actually refining an [artificial general intelligence] to maximize profits for Microsoft, rather than for the benefit of humanity.”
Musk cofounded OpenAI with Altman in 2015, but left in 2018 over a conflict of interest with the company’s development. The lawsuit claims a breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and unfair business practices. Musk is asking that OpenAI be ordered to open its research and technology to the public — and upping the stakes by requesting Altman give up money from those alleged illegal practices. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In July, Musk announced his own AI venture, xAI, with a goal to “understand the true nature of the universe.” The company is independent from X Corp, but will work with Musk’s other companies: X, formerly Twitter, and Tesla. In November, Musk said xAI was ready to release its first AI product “to a select group.”
Meanwhile, OpenAI’s partnership with Microsoft has been under scrutiny from regulators over its potential threat to market competition in the UK and EU. The AI company is also reportedly being examined by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) about whether its investors were misled after Altman was fired by the company’s former board of directors in November.