Elon Musk said he would take legal action against Apple and OpenAI after accusing the iPhone maker of favoring the AI firm over rivals, including his xAI. Musk claimed Apple made it impossible for any AI app other than OpenAI’s ChatGPT to reach the top of the App Store, which he alleged “is an unequivocal antitrust violation.” The threat also reflects Musk’s long-running feud with Sam Altman, with whom Musk co-founded OpenAI before separating over disagreements on how the AI venture should be run. Altman rejected Musk’s recent accusations. “OpenAI will just stay focused on making great products,” he posted on Musk’s social media site X.
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Elon Musk lashed out against Apple Inc.’s app store practices late on Monday, accusing the iPhone maker of favoring OpenAI.
The billionaire founder of xAI Holdings, which now houses the Grok artificial intelligence team and X social network, said Apple makes it impossible for anyone other than OpenAI to reach the top of the App Store charts, a sought-after global spotlight for app developers. In a pinned post on his X account, Musk asked if Apple is “playing politics” by not highlighting his products.
His comments mark the biggest fight that Musk has picked since his confrontation with US President Donald Trump in June, when each man posted disparaging remarks about the other on his own social network. Apple didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Musk added that xAI will take legal action against what he deemed an antitrust violation. Apple and OpenAI — whose ChatGPT is the most-downloaded free iPhone app in the US, ahead of Grok at No. 5 — have a partnership around AI built into the latest iPhones. Musk, 54, has a long-running feud with OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman, which dates back to disagreements that led to their split after the two founded OpenAI together.
Altman, 40, responded to the Monday claims of impropriety by turning the focus to how Musk manages the X network, suggesting he manipulates it to serve his personal interests. “But OpenAI will just stay focused on making great products,” Altman added in his post on X. Asked for comment, an OpenAI representative pointed to Altman’s post.
— With assistance from Newley Purnell
(Updates with response from OpenAI in fifth paragraph.)
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