Elon Musk Re-Sues OpenAI, "Exposes" ICO Plan in 2018

On November 16, Elon Musk officially re-sues OpenAI, revealing internal conflicts, the organization's 2018 token ICO plan, and its relationship with Microsoft.

Just entering the White House, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has re-sue OpenAI with shocking revelations about the organization he co-founded.

In a court filing, Elon Musk "exposed" that OpenAI once intended to issue tokens through an ICO in 2018. OpenAI co-founders Sam Altman and Greg Brockman proposed this plan with the goal of solving the company's financial problems.

The lawsuit said that Elon Musk strongly opposed the idea. He believed that an ICO would be nothing more than destroying the reputation and ideals that OpenAI had previously pursued. Musk feared that OpenAI would degenerate from a non-profit organization dedicated to the mission of developing safe artificial intelligence into a company that chases money, regardless of the consequences.

The disagreement over vision and strategy led to internal conflicts between Elon Musk and the co-founders of OpenAI. Elon Musk later proposed merging OpenAI with Tesla to solve financial problems but was not approved. Finally, he left OpenAI in February 2018 and founded his own AI company called xAI.

Not stopping at OpenAI, Musk also expanded his "sights" to Microsoft. The technology billionaire believes that Microsoft has taken advantage of the partnership to access and exploit OpenAI's technology and talent, serving its own ambitions in the field of artificial intelligence. At the same time, speaking out against Microsoft's $1 billion investment in OpenAI in 2019, which pushed OpenAI to move to a for-profit model,

This is not the first time Elon Musk has sued OpenAI. In March 2024, Elon Musk sued OpenAI for allegedly going against the original agreement, prioritizing profits over the common good, and having an "ambiguous" relationship with Microsoft.

OpenAI later responded to the lawsuit with harsh words:

"It is sad that someone we once admired, someone who inspired us to achieve great things, would turn around and sue us when OpenAI was achieving success without him."

The lawsuit was later withdrawn in June 2024 without any explanation from Elon Musk. It wasn't until August 2024 that the Tesla CEO unexpectedly added accusations that OpenAI had misled him about the organization's non-profit nature, "pocketing" more than $44 million of his previous investment.