Microsoft now targeted as Elon Musk amends OpenAI lawsuit

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) has been added as a new defendant, according to a newly amended lawsuit by Elon Musk against generative artificial intelligence startup OpenAI.

Also added to the lawsuit were LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Dee Templeton, a current Microsoft executive who previously worked at OpenAI.

The amended lawsuit was filed on November 14, in the U.S. district court for the northern district of California. Musk has accused OpenAI and Microsoft of trying to “monopolize the generative AI market,” according to the lawsuit. Musk’s company, xAI, was also added to the lawsuit as a plaintiff, as was former OpenAI board member Shivon Zilis. Zilis is now an executive at one of Musk’s other companies, Neuralink, and is the mother of three of Musk’s children.

Musk first sued OpenAI — which he co-founded in December 2015 along with Sam Altman, Ilya Sutskever and Greg Brockman — earlier this year for allegedly putting “profit over humanity.” He re-opened the suit in August after dropping it on the basis that it “lacked teeth,” Musk’s lawyer Marc Toberoff said previously.

Microsoft has invested approximately $14B into OpenAI, including joining the generative AI’s latest $6.6B funding round, which valued it at $157B. Musk’s xAI is also in the process of raising funds that would value the company at $50B or more.

Microsoft has not yet responded to a request for comment from Seeking Alpha.