Altman Testifies Musk Considered Giving OpenAI to His Kids

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman appeared in court this morning. He addressed claims from former co-founder Elon Musk in a lawsuit about OpenAI's shift to a for-profit model.

Musk's legal team started by questioning Altman's view on the accusation. They said OpenAI founders took a charity when starting a subsidiary to sell AI products. Altman paused before responding. He called the idea hard to understand. OpenAI built one of the world's biggest charities, he said. The foundation does strong work now and plans more.

Lawyers for Musk stressed the foundation's size. It holds about $200 billion in assets. They noted it lacked full-time staff until this year. OpenAI board chair Bret Taylor explained that earlier. Converting company equity to cash proved tough. The latest 2025 changes fixed that.

Questions on Safety and Funding

Musk's side focused on OpenAI's safety promise. They asked if business growth sidelined it. Altman pointed to 2017 talks on funding big AI models. Musk's safety ideas raised red flags for him then.

Altman recalled a tense exchange. Founders debated a for-profit setup. Someone asked what happens if Musk died while leading it. Musk replied OpenAI could go to his children, Altman said.

That control idea troubled Altman. OpenAI aimed to avoid one person holding advanced AI. From his time at Y Combinator, a top startup accelerator, Altman saw founders cling to power.

OpenAI began in 2015. Musk, Altman, Greg Brockman, and Ilya Sutskever started it as a non-profit. The goal was safe artificial general intelligence for humanity. Tensions grew over direction and money needs.

Clashes Over Management

Altman said Musk's style suited factories and engineering. It failed at a research lab. Musk misunderstood running one, Altman claimed.

Musk upset key staff. He once told Brockman and Sutskever to rank researchers by achievements. Then cut many jobs. That hurt the team's spirit for years.

Altman protected the efforts of Brockman and Sutskever. They led daily work while Musk ran Tesla and SpaceX, and Altman handled Y Combinator.

Disputes lingered. Musk quit the board. He launched AI projects at Tesla and founded xAI in 2023 to rival OpenAI.

Continued Contact After Split

Altman stayed in touch with Musk. He shared updates, asked for money, and got input.

OpenAI lawyers said Musk knew about key deals. He joined some investments he now attacks as harming the non-profit.

In 2018, they discussed Microsoft funding OpenAI. Altman called it positive. Musk showed memes on his phone during a long chat.

Microsoft's deal marked a turning point. It gave OpenAI billions to scale models like GPT. OpenAI grew fast with ChatGPT in 2022. Valuation hit tens of billions. The non-profit foundation oversees capped-profit arm.

Musk sued OpenAI in 2024. He claims it broke founding non-profit pledges. Trial covers board fights, funding shifts, and safety vows.

Altman framed his testimony around shared history. OpenAI pushed AI forward despite rifts. Musk built Tesla's AI for self-driving and xAI for truth-seeking systems.

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