A federal jury on Monday ruled that billionaire Elon Musk filed his lawsuit against OpenAI too late, handing a major legal victory to the ChatGPT maker and ending a closely watched Silicon Valley courtroom battle.
Image: Pakistan Today
The decision came after a three-week trial in Oakland federal court, where Musk accused OpenAI and its leadership of abandoning the organisation’s original nonprofit mission in favour of profit-driven expansion.
Committee found that Musk’s claims against OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman, President Greg Brockman, The OpenAI Foundation, and Microsoft were barred by statutes of limitations.
Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers accepted the jury’s recommendation, effectively ending the case before jurors considered the broader allegations raised by Musk.
Ruling removed a potentially serious legal threat for OpenAI, which Musk had sought to force back into a nonprofit structure — a move that could have disrupted its planned public offering and complicated relationships with major investors including Microsoft, Amazon, and SoftBank.
Outside the courthouse, OpenAI attorney William Savitt described the lawsuit as an attempt to undermine a competitor, saying the jury had rejected Musk’s narrative.
Musk had argued that a $38 million contribution he made to OpenAI was intended to support research focused on benefiting humanity rather than commercial profit.
Jury, however, focused first on whether Musk had filed the case within the legally permitted timeframe after his last contribution to the organisation in 2020 and concluded that he had not.
Because of that finding, the court did not proceed to examine allegations that OpenAI leaders had misused donations or broken commitments regarding the company’s nonprofit structure.
The trial featured testimony and scrutiny of both Musk and Altman, including discussion of OpenAI’s internal culture and the company’s rapid transformation into one of the world’s most valuable artificial intelligence firms.
Analysts said the verdict removed uncertainty surrounding OpenAI’s future business plans and represented a significant legal and strategic win for the company and its investors.
