Elon Musk’s xAI files lawsuit accusing Apple and | Australian Markets

Elon Musk’s xAI sued Apple and OpenAI on Monday, accusing the pair of an “anticompetitive scheme” to thwart artificial intelligence rivals.

The lawsuit, filed by Mr Musk’s AI startup xAI and its social community business X, alleges Apple and OpenAI have “colluded” to take care of monopolies within the smartphone and generative AI markets.

Mr Musk’s xAI acquired X in March in an all-stock transaction.

It accuses Apple of de-prioritising so-called super apps and generative AI chatbot opponents, corresponding to xAI’s Grok, in its App Store rankings, whereas favouring OpenAI by integrating its ChatGPT chatbot into Apple merchandise.

“In a desperate bid to protect its smartphone monopoly, Apple has joined forces with the company that most benefits from inhibiting competition and innovation in AI: OpenAI, a monopolist in the market for generative AI chatbots,” based on the grievance, which was filed in US District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

An OpenAI spokesperson mentioned in a assertion, “This latest filing is consistent with Mr Musk’s ongoing pattern of harassment.”

Representatives from Apple didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.

The Tesla CEO launched xAI in 2023 in a bid to compete with OpenAI and different main chatbot makers.

Mr Musk earlier this month threatened to sue Apple for “an unequivocal antitrust violation,” saying in a post on X that the company “is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store.”

After Mr Musk threatened to sue Apple, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman responded, “This is a remarkable claim given what I have heard alleged that Elon does to manipulate X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn’t like.”

An Apple spokesperson beforehand mentioned that its App Store was designed to be “fair and free of bias,” and that the company options “thousands of apps” utilizing a selection of indicators.

Apple final yr partnered with OpenAI to combine ChatGPT into iPhone, iPad, Mac laptop computer and desktop merchandise.

Several customers replied to Mr Musk’s post on X by way of its Community Notes function saying that rival chatbot apps corresponding to DeepSeek and Perplexity have been ranked No. 1 on the App Store after Apple and OpenAI introduced their partnership.

The lawsuit is the latest twist in an ongoing conflict between Mr Musk and Altman. Mr Musk co-founded OpenAI alongside Altman in 2015, earlier than leaving the startup in 2018 on account of disagreements over OpenAI’s direction.

Mr Musk sued OpenAI and Altman final yr, accusing them of breach of contract by placing business pursuits forward of its unique mission to develop AI “for the benefit of humanity broadly.”

In a counterclaim, OpenAI has alleged that Musk and xAI engaged in “harassment” by way of litigation, assaults on social media and within the press, and by way of a “sham bid” to buy the ChatGPT-maker for $97.4 billion designed to hurt the company’s business relationships.