Elon Musk Sues OpenAI And CEO Sam Altman Over Ties To Microsoft
On Thursday, Elon Musk sued OpenAI for breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and unfair business practices. OpenAI was founded in 2015 as a non-profit with the goal of benefiting all of humanity. Among the founders were Musk and the now-CEO Sam Altman.
The lawsuit alleges that although the company claims to still adhere to the founding principle, "OpenAI, Inc. has been transformed into a closed-source de facto subsidiary of the largest technology company in the world: Microsoft." Microsoft partnered with OpenAI in 2020 for $13 billion. Since then, the company has continued to develop Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), and the lawsuit states that the company is using the AGI to increase Microsoft's profits under its new board.
The outlined goal of the lawsuit is to force OpenAI to "adhere to the Founding Agreement and return to its mission to develop AGI for the benefit of humanity,” and have co-founders Altman and Greg Brockman pay back profits. Microsoft is not named as a defendant.
The development of GPT-4 and Altman's rehiring are mentioned in the lawsuit
The lawsuit alleges that the release of GPT-4 is evidence of the apparent shift in OpenAI's goals. Previously, OpenAI technology was open-source, with the public plugged into what was happening. But GPT-4, launched last year, was kept secret during development. The lawsuit claims that the secrecy was "driven by commercial considerations, not safety."
Another incident highlighted in the lawsuit was Altman's firing and subsequent rehiring to OpenAI at the hands of the board. CNN claims that industry experts saw the rehiring as the right move for commercializing AGI. The lawsuit alleges that the debacle with Altman showcased Microsoft's control over the company, and noted that "the public is still in the dark regarding what exactly the Board's 'deliberative review process' revealed” that resulted in Altman's firing.
OpenAI has amassed a value of $90 billion because Altman, Brockman, and Chief Scientist Ilya Sutskever launched the for-profit OpenAI LP inside the company in 2019. This was a year after Musk left the OpenAI board. Since his departure, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX have been very vocal about the possible threat AGI poses to humanity. He has even gone on record saying that it could be more dangerous than nuclear weapons.
The lawsuit claims that "Where some like Mr. Musk see an existential threat in AGI, others see AGI as a source of profit and power." Neither OpenAI nor Microsoft has publicly addressed the lawsuit as of now.