- Elon Musk is seeking an injunction against OpenAI to stop it from becoming a for-profit entity.
- It’s part of Musk’s lawsuit against Sam Altman, who says OpenAI engaged in anti-competitive behavior.
- The order would block OpenAI’s profitable transition and partnerships with Microsoft.
Elon Musk is trying to get a court to stop OpenAI from turning into a for-profit entity, a new filing shows.
In a motion filed Friday, Musk’s lawyers asked Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers of the US District Court for the Northern District of California to issue an injunction against OpenAI, preventing it from completing its transition from a non-profit to a for-profit company.
The request also argues that OpenAI has engaged in anti-competitive behavior by discouraging investors from partnering with its competitors, such as Musk’s company xAI, and has benefited from “misappropriated competitively sensitive information” through its ties to Microsoft.
Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn, previously served on the boards of OpenAI and Microsoft simultaneously. Musk’s lawyers write that Hoffman’s role at both companies, which they describe as “Microsoft-OpenAI board nexus,” resulted in improper information sharing between the companies and monopolistic market practices. Musk’s lawyers say the partnership violates antitrust law.
“It would be one thing if Microsoft once again engaged in anti-competitive behavior, this time with OpenAI. It would be another if OpenAI, aided and abetted by Microsoft, violated the terms of Musk’s fundamental contributions to charity,” the filing said, referring to OpenAI as a charity because of its founding as a nonprofit organization. “But OpenAI and Microsoft together leverage Musk’s donations so they can build a profitable monopoly, a which now specifically targets xAI, is also very much. Plaintiffs and the public need a break.”
If granted, the request for a restraining order would hinder OpenAI’s profitable transition and force the company to end its partnership with Microsoft.
Lawyers for Microsoft, Hoffman and Musk did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.