Apple Demands OpenAI Halt Exploitation of Its Trade Secrets
OpenAI’s project to launch its first proprietary connected devices has become the subject of a legal dispute with Apple that escalated this week, after the latter demanded an end to the exploitation of its trade secrets and sought to search the computers of the team developing ChatGPT, which in turn requested that Apple drop its “baseless” lawsuits.
In a filing submitted to a federal court in San Jose, California, on Monday, Apple no longer referenced attempts to lure its employees away to join OpenAI, as was the case in the initial complaint filed on July 10. Instead, it complained of “repeated and deliberate thefts” aimed at “advancing OpenAI’s software and its ambitions in the computer hardware sector.”
Apple’s petition stated that “OpenAI should not be allowed to use Apple’s secrets to gain an undeserved advantage” in this competition, causing harm that “cannot be remedied by monetary damages.”
Its lawyers wrote in their submission that “Apple built its reputation by paying close attention to the smallest details. This complaint,” which they described as “corrupt to the core,” is “the opposite of that.”
On October 1, Federal Judge Edward G. Davila will hear arguments from both sides, who continue to cooperate, as ChatGPT has been integrated into Apple’s products since 2024.
OpenAI’s lawyers argued that “Apple should not use a baseless complaint as an excuse to compensate for its difficulties in recruiting and retaining collaborators, as well as its failure to integrate artificial intelligence into its products.”
They recalled California legislation that “encourages” employee mobility and which “is credited with the technological revolution that has made the state the object of envious attention from around the world.”
According to the initial complaint, more than 400 former Apple employees now work for OpenAI.
Apple, for its part, argued that “the damages are occurring in real time.” In the absence of any court orders, OpenAI can each day “integrate” more of this information into “the development of its devices,” making it increasingly difficult to restore the status quo.
To persuade the judge of the urgency of the case, Apple relied on an article published in TechCrunch detailing leaks about OpenAI’s highly anticipated first device: a connected speaker without a screen, designed in collaboration with Jony Ive, Apple’s former head of design.
Bloomberg reported that the device, circular in design like a donut, would cost between $300 and $400 and is expected to be launched in 2027.
OpenAI has not confirmed these leaks. In court, it revealed that it is working on “something entirely new and different from what is available at Apple,” noting that Apple “has never claimed that OpenAI’s device shares any design... or supply or configuration element with an Apple product.”
Apple, for its part, accuses OpenAI’s head of computer hardware, Tang Tang, who was previously Apple’s vice president of design, of using an internal codename for an unreleased product to extract information from candidates.
Apple revealed in its lawsuit that Tang was asking candidates during interviews to bring “prototypes” or design files during specific idea review sessions, much like school students.
OpenAI responded by stating that these are “common practices in the sector” and that Apple did not mention “any specific trade secret” that could have been disclosed to Tang.
His lawyers said that Tang “asked candidates and members of his team not to disclose any confidential information to their former employers.”
OpenAI also argues that Apple failed to adequately protect its proprietary data, noting that it “remained connected to the personal accounts” of engineer Chang Liu, one of the former employees sued on Monday, “for a long time after his departure,” which constitutes negligence that precludes invoking the confidential nature of the information.
The lawsuit comes at a highly sensitive time for OpenAI, which is preparing to go public with an estimated valuation of around $852 billion and faces fierce competition from its rival and San Francisco-based neighbor, Anthropic.
