OpenAI has accused Elon Musk of executing a 'legal ambush' by suddenly changing the relief he is seeking in his lawsuit against the company, weeks before a trial with implications exceeding $100 billion, according to Bloomberg Technology.
The lawsuit sits at the centre of a bitter and public falling-out between Musk, a co-founder of OpenAI, and the organisation he helped create before departing its board in 2018. Musk has argued that OpenAI abandoned its founding mission as a nonprofit dedicated to developing AI for the benefit of humanity, and has pursued legal action seeking to block or reverse the company's ongoing transition to a for-profit structure.
A Last-Minute Pivot That OpenAI Says Changes Everything
OpenAI's core objection is procedural as much as substantive. The company alleges that Musk's legal team has materially altered what outcomes it is pursuing through the lawsuit at a late stage, leaving OpenAI insufficient time to respond adequately before trial. In litigation of this scale and complexity, a shift in claimed relief — the legal term for what a plaintiff is asking a court to grant — can significantly reshape the entire defence strategy.
OpenAI has not disclosed the precise nature of the alleged change, but characterising it as an 'ambush' signals the company believes it is substantive, not technical.
OpenAI argues the late change undermines its ability to mount a fair defence in one of the most consequential legal battles in AI history.
The timing matters enormously. With trial approaching, both sides face compressed deadlines for filings, witness preparation, and evidentiary submissions. Any court ruling on the ambush allegation — whether to allow the change, restrict it, or grant OpenAI additional preparation time — could meaningfully affect how the trial unfolds.
What Is Actually at Stake
The $100 billion-plus figure attached to this trial reflects the current scale of OpenAI's valuation and the potential financial consequences of any court-ordered restructuring or asset-related remedy. OpenAI completed a $40 billion funding round in April 2025, led by SoftBank, which valued the company at $300 billion — making it one of the most valuable private companies on earth. Any legal outcome that disrupts its for-profit conversion could affect that valuation, future fundraising, and the SoftBank deal's structure.
Musk, meanwhile, has his own AI venture: xAI, which he founded in 2023 and which raised $6 billion in a Series B round in 2024. Critics have suggested his lawsuit against OpenAI serves competitive as well as principled purposes — a charge Musk's camp rejects.
The Broader Fight Over OpenAI's Soul
The lawsuit is one of several legal and regulatory challenges facing OpenAI's transition from a capped-profit structure to a fully for-profit public benefit corporation. The California and Delaware attorneys general are both reviewing aspects of the conversion, given OpenAI's nonprofit origins and the question of whether its charitable assets are being adequately protected.
Musk's lawsuit has consistently argued that OpenAI's founders — including Sam Altman and Musk himself — made commitments to operate as a nonprofit, and that pivoting to profit-driven governance betrays donors, early employees, and the public interest. OpenAI counters that the conversion is legally sound, necessary to compete for the capital required to build frontier AI, and subject to appropriate oversight.
The 'ambush' accusation adds a combative new dimension to proceedings that were already adversarial. Courts take procedural fairness seriously, and a judge may need to rule on whether Musk's legal team must revert to its prior position or whether OpenAI is entitled to additional time and potentially additional discovery.
What This Means
The outcome of this trial could set a legal precedent for how AI companies founded as nonprofits are permitted to restructure as commercial entities — with direct consequences for OpenAI's $300 billion valuation, its SoftBank partnership, and the governance norms of the broader AI industry.