Headline: Musk vs. OpenAI Goes to Trial — Jury Hears Opening Arguments as Elon Stakes Claim to OpenAI’s Origins and Seeks up to $134B for Charity Opening arguments in the high-stakes Elon Musk–OpenAI civil trial began April 28 in Oakland. Musk’s lead lawyer, Steven Molo, told a nine-person jury that OpenAI “would not exist” without Musk’s early $38 million in funding and his recruitment of top AI talent — framing the case as a fight over the nonprofit mission Musk says was sidelined when OpenAI went commercial. Musk is pursuing as much as $134 billion in alleged “wrongful gains,” not for himself but to be redirected into OpenAI’s nonprofit arm. What happened in court - Molo opened by urging jurors to set aside preconceptions about Musk, saying “without Elon Musk, there would be no OpenAI, pure and simple.” - The jury was chosen after a five-hour voir dire during which many prospective jurors admitted disliking Musk; Judge Gonzalez Rogers acknowledged that “the reality is people don’t like him” but said she was confident the panel would follow the law. - Two claims remain in play: breach of charitable trust and unjust enrichment. Musk initially filed 26 claims in August 2024; subsequent rulings and strategy narrowed the case to these two counts. What Musk is asking for - Damages estimated up to $134 billion that his lawyers characterize as wrongful profits by OpenAI’s for-profit arm and Microsoft. - Musk has said he will not keep any award personally; he asked in January that damages be funneled back into OpenAI’s nonprofit mission. - Possible remedies Musk seeks include removing CEO Sam Altman and Chief Scientist Greg Brockman from leadership, unwinding OpenAI’s October 2025 restructuring into a public benefit corporation, and redirecting profits to the nonprofit. Background and competing narratives - Musk co-founded OpenAI in 2015 with Altman and others as a nonprofit. He left the board in 2018 after disputes over control and later filed suit (his original complaint dates to 2023). OpenAI restructured into a public benefit corporation in October 2025; the nonprofit retained a 26% stake and additional warrants, a configuration OpenAI says preserved its mission and Musk says buried it. - OpenAI’s expected IPO — Reuters has reported it could value the company near $1 trillion — is one major industry consequence the company warns the lawsuit could complicate. OpenAI and Microsoft’s anticipated defense - OpenAI’s legal team is expected to argue that Musk knew of and, in some cases, supported moving toward a for-profit model before leaving the board, and that he pushed ideas like folding OpenAI into Tesla. - OpenAI contends the lawsuit is commercially motivated — an attempt to harm a competitor to Musk’s xAI — and points to recent business moves as evidence. For example, crypto.news has reported that Musk’s xAI merger with SpaceX in February 2026 valued xAI at $250 billion, and that Musk required Wall Street banks vying for SpaceX’s planned $1.75 trillion IPO to subscribe to Grok, his AI chatbot — a tactic OpenAI cites as evidence of commercial motives. Trial schedule, procedure and stakes - Judge Gonzalez Rogers split the trial into a liability phase and a remedies phase. Each side has tightly controlled time: 22 hours allocated to Musk’s team and 22 hours to OpenAI and Microsoft combined, plus an extra five hours for Microsoft’s separate defense. Those totals cover witnesses, opening statements, and closings. - The liability phase is expected to run through about May 21, with jury deliberations to begin around May 12. If jurors issue an advisory verdict in Musk’s favor, the remedies phase — where the remedies Musk seeks would be decided — will be handled solely by Judge Gonzalez Rogers. Other legal pressures and market reaction - OpenAI is confronting another front: a criminal investigation reported by crypto.news and others by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier into whether ChatGPT played a role in advising an accused Florida State University shooter, adding to the company’s legal exposure ahead of an IPO. - Market analysts expect the trial to be bruising but not crippling. Wedbush analyst Dan Ives predicted “scrapes and bruises” rather than fatal damage — with his characteristic caveat about Musk’s resilience. Who’s expected to testify Witnesses likely to take the stand over the roughly four-week liability phase include Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, former OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, former CTO Mira Murati, and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. Why crypto-watchers should care - The outcome could reshape governance precedents for nonprofit-to-for-profit AI spinouts and influence the timeline and valuation for OpenAI’s IPO — a major event for AI capital markets and investors. - The case also highlights the increasing overlap between AI competition and broader capital markets: corporate maneuvers, bank deal dynamics (like Grok subscriptions tied to a SpaceX IPO pitch), and legal strategies are now part of the competitive toolbox. The trial’s liability phase will continue through May, with the market and the AI community watching closely for both legal and business fallout. Read more AI-generated news on: undefined/news