A recently filed court document reveals that Elon Musk is pursuing between $79 billion and $134 billion in damages from OpenAI and Microsoft, claiming he was defrauded of the $38 million in seed funding he provided when helping to found OpenAI in 2015. His legal team argues that this alleged deception entitles Musk to a percentage of OpenAI’s current valuation, estimated at around $500 billion.
The details were disclosed in a filing submitted ahead of a high-profile jury trial scheduled for April in Oakland, California. The damages calculation was prepared by expert witness C. Paul Wazzan, a financial economist, who estimated that Musk could be owed between $65.5 billion and $109.4 billion in “wrongful gains” from OpenAI, with an additional $13.3 billion to $25.1 billion attributed to Microsoft.
Musk is also suing OpenAI’s leadership, including CEO Sam Altman and President Greg Brockman, alleging the company abandoned its original nonprofit mission and misled him in the process. OpenAI has strongly denied the accusations, describing the lawsuit as baseless and part of an ongoing campaign against the company, and says it is prepared to defend itself at trial.