On April 29, Elon Musk displayed visible impatience while testifying in court. The billionaire appeared irritated when questioned by an attorney for OpenAI about whether he had reneged on his financial commitments made during the startup's early development phase.

This high-profile trial entered its second day of Musk's testimony. The case centers on his allegations that OpenAI has abandoned its altruistic mission in favor of pursuing profits. During the proceedings, the world's wealthiest individual was placed in a defensive position regarding the actual extent of his financial support for OpenAI from its inception.

Musk engaged in repeated heated exchanges with OpenAI's attorney, William Savitt, over the precision of the questioning, multiple times stating that the questions were "unfair" and "misleading."

Savitt repeatedly presented Musk with what he termed "simple" yes-or-no questions, but Musk contended that such issues could not be answered so simplistically.

"Your question is not simple at all," Musk stated in court. "It's fundamentally designed to set a trap for me."

Musk filed a lawsuit in 2024, accusing OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and President Greg Brockman of leveraging billions of dollars in funding from Microsoft to convert the company into a for-profit entity for personal gain. OpenAI and Altman have countersued, alleging malicious harassment by Musk and asserting that his true motive is to suppress a competitor and pave the way for xAI, an artificial intelligence startup he co-founded in 2023.

Savitt pressed Musk on the total amount of capital he actually contributed during OpenAI's startup phase. Musk revealed that he had been making quarterly donations to OpenAI and covering rent for its office space until he later "lost confidence" in the company's management.

Musk co-founded the non-profit organization with Altman, Brockman, and Ilya Sutskever, but there are conflicting accounts regarding the scale of Musk's financial support.

When OpenAI was announced in 2015, the non-profit stated that Musk had pledged to contribute up to $1 billion ultimately to support its mission of developing AI "to benefit humanity." However, Musk posted on the social platform X in 2023 that he had actually donated approximately $100 million.

"Ultimately, you never invested anywhere near a billion dollars in OpenAI, did you?" Savitt asked Musk.

Musk responded that around 2017, he began to have doubts about OpenAI's direction and gradually lost trust in the founding team.

Savitt interrupted him. "My question is simple," he said, repeating it.

U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers intervened in their dispute, instructing Musk to answer Savitt's question directly. Musk then asked for the question to be repeated.

"My question is: You contributed far less than a billion dollars to OpenAI, correct?" Savitt said.

"Strictly in terms of cash, I contributed $38 million," Musk answered.

The two are familiar adversaries in the courtroom. Savitt, one of the top corporate litigators in the United States, represented Twitter in its 2022 lawsuit to force Musk to complete his agreed $44 billion acquisition of the company. That case was settled before going to trial, with Musk ultimately conceding.

The Oakland trial carries high stakes for OpenAI, even threatening its existence. Musk's lawsuit seeks substantial remedies: up to $134 billion in damages, the removal of Altman and Brockman from their leadership positions, and the reversal of OpenAI's transition to a for-profit structure completed in October 2023.

Much of Musk's testimony so far has focused on his disagreements with OpenAI's leadership at a time when they were exploring strategies to raise sufficient capital to compete with Google, owned by Alphabet, and other profit-driven AI pioneers.

In 2017, Musk and the other co-founders discussed creating a for-profit subsidiary to fund AI research and development. The proposal at the time was for Musk to hold a majority stake in this subsidiary, granting him near-total operational control.

Under the initial plan, a 12-member board was envisioned, with Musk appointing four members, and Altman, Brockman, and Sutskever each holding one seat. Musk told the jury that the intention was for his majority stake to be diluted quickly as more investors joined.

However, Musk testified that the "final straw" leading to the relationship's breakdown was when the other co-founders appeared to oppose this proposal, expressing concerns about it. The plan ultimately never materialized.

"They went back on the agreement that was made," Musk said. "I found it hypocritical. What they really wanted was to create a for-profit company and keep as much equity as possible for themselves."

Savitt presented the jury with email correspondence from 2017 involving Musk, Sutskever, Brockman, and others, discussing this potential collaboration. In the emails, Musk suggested the need to adjust the development path to align with commercial requirements.

In the same email exchange, Musk also offered to gift Tesla vehicles free of charge to Sutskever and other OpenAI employees.

Musk left the OpenAI board in 2018 and founded the for-profit AI company xAI five years later. xAI was recently acquired by SpaceX, the aerospace company that is progressing towards an initial public offering.

Meanwhile, OpenAI's valuation is approaching one trillion dollars and is also preparing for a public listing.

Musk told the jury that OpenAI was initially established as a non-profit due to his concerns about AI safety and his desire to ensure the technology's future would not be entirely controlled by companies like Google.

During the April 29 hearing, Savitt asked Musk if he believed the transition of an AI company to a for-profit model created safety risks. Musk stated that he believed it "does create some safety risk."

"Does the for-profit xAI that you founded create that safety risk?" Savitt pressed.

"It does," Musk replied.

Throughout his testimony, Musk repeatedly emphasized that he is not opposed to the creation of for-profit AI companies in principle, but is strongly opposed to converting a non-profit organization into a for-profit enterprise.

"It's like having your cake and eating it too, benefiting from both sides," Musk said.

Savitt also raised a series of questions concerning potential conflicts of interest between Musk's role at OpenAI and his positions at Tesla and Neuralink, both of which invest heavily in AI.

The lawyer pointed out that despite Musk's fiduciary duty to OpenAI, he secretly attempted in 2017 to recruit top research talent away from the non-profit to join his other companies.

Savitt stated that Musk had recruited prominent OpenAI scientist Andrej Karpathy to work at Tesla. He presented the court with an email from Musk to a Neuralink executive that read, "Feel free to recruit people from OpenAI to Neuralink. I am fine with it."

"I believe it's a free world," Musk responded. "People should have the right to choose where they want to work."