The court dismissed xAI's lawsuit against OpenAI: Musk loses the battle over trade secrets.
A US federal court has dismissed Elon Musk's xAI lawsuit against OpenAI, which involved allegations of trade secret misappropriation. Moreover, Judge Rita Lin ruled that the lawsuit cannot be refiled — this is a final decision on the matter.
The core of the dispute was xAI's claim that OpenAI allegedly induced former company engineer Xuechen Li to disclose confidential information about the Grok chatbot. Specifically, the case centered on Li's presentation during a job interview, where he described his experience working with reinforcement learning and post-training systems for Grok 4.
Judge Lin clearly stated the position: discussing previous work experience during a job interview is not evidence that the hiring company encouraged the candidate to disclose trade secrets. This is a logical and balanced approach that sets an important precedent for the entire industry. Talent acquisition is not espionage, and courts should not conflate these concepts.
It is worth noting that this is Elon Musk's second defeat in legal proceedings against OpenAI in less than a month. Earlier, in May, a jury dismissed his separate $150 billion lawsuit. This series of setbacks suggests that Musk's legal arguments in this conflict, to put it mildly, do not align with market realities. Perhaps the founder of Tesla and xAI overestimates his ability to prove facts that lie more in the realm of corporate disagreements rather than actual legal violations.