Elon Musk testified in court on day two of his lawsuit against OpenAI, accusing the AI company's leadership of "looting the nonprofit" and abandoning the charitable mission he helped establish when he co-founded the organization.
Musk sued OpenAI in March, claiming the company violated its founding agreement by prioritizing profit over public benefit. The lawsuit centers on OpenAI's shift from a nonprofit model toward commercial interests, particularly after the company formed a capped-profit entity and secured major funding from Microsoft.
Musk's testimony underscores the core dispute: whether OpenAI's leaders, including CEO Sam Altman, breached their obligation to keep the company's work accessible and aligned with humanity's interests. Musk argues the nonprofit structure was essential to the company's founding purpose and that executives have since enriched themselves at the expense of that mission.
OpenAI has defended its evolution as necessary to build artificial general intelligence responsibly, contending that commercial revenue enables the research required to achieve that goal safely. The company maintains it remains committed to its mission despite structural changes.
The case raises broader questions about how AI companies balance nonprofit ideals with the substantial capital needed for cutting-edge research and development.