Law360 (May 18, 2026, 1:32 PM EDT) -- In an advisory decision Monday, a California federal jury cleared OpenAI and executives Sam Altman and Greg Brockman of allegations they breached the nonprofit's charitable trust by converting to a for-profit, handing billionaire Elon Musk a defeat in a closely watched three-week trial that threatened to shake up the artificial intelligence industry.

After less than two hours of deliberating, a unanimous nine-member jury found OpenAI and its two co-founders are not liable for breaching the nonprofit's charitable trust to unjustly enrich themselves. Jurors concluded that both claims are barred by the statute of limitations. In light of its finding, the jury didn't need to reach a separate question about whether Microsoft aided and abetted the alleged breach.

The jury's decision Monday is strictly advisory. U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers will ultimately rule on the matter in writing, taking the jury's decision as guidance.

In light of accepting OpenAI's statute of limitations defense, jurors didn't reach OpenAI's defense that Musk's own efforts to hire away OpenAI employees to create a rival AI business amounted to "unclean hands."

After the verdict was read Monday, Judge Gonzalez Rogers orally dismissed the claims, including Musk's claim Microsoft aided and abetted the alleged breach. She told the parties that she would issue a brief ruling on the dismissal in writing.

"I think there is a substantial amount of evidence to support the jury's finding, which is why I was prepared to dismiss it on the spot," the judge said.

The jury's advisory verdict marks an end to the high-profile dispute between Musk, Microsoft and OpenAI, which is now valued at around $852 billion. Since the three-week trial began on April 27 in Oakland, California, it has drawn hundreds of onlookers, including attorneys, reporters and members of the public, who have lined up outside the courthouse before dawn to get seats in the courtroom.

Numerous peaceful protesters have also gathered daily outside the federal courthouse, chanting and waiving large signs or other props that criticize both parties, while demanding actions like "No AI Over People" and "AI: Either We Stop It or It Stops Us."

The trial itself focused on Musk's claims that OpenAI abandoned its nonprofit mission of creating open-source AI that benefits all humanity by transferring its intellectual property and employees to a for-profit entity in exchange for an equity stake in the for-profit as Microsoft invested $13 billion.

During a tense, and at times comical, examination, Musk testified as the first witness, recalling how he helped Altman, Brockman and computer scientist Ilya Sutskever found OpenAI in 2015 as a nonprofit and as a "counterpoint" to Google's profit-driven, closed-source DeepMind AI.

As evidence, Musk pointed to his own text messages with Altman in 2015 in which Altman asked Musk to donate $30 million over five years. Musk ultimately donated $38 million, but his attorney argued that Musk conditioned his donations on a specific nonprofit mission when he replied to Altman, "Let's discuss governance. This is critical. I don't want to fund something that goes in what turns out to be the wrong direction."

Weeks later, Altman wrote Musk that he planned to create a "pure play" nonprofit with a "crystal clear focus" on safely developing AI to be distributed "widely to humanity," according to trial evidence.

But by 2017, Musk and the other co-founders were at loggerheads over how the nonprofit could raise the billions of dollars it needed to create the AI tools and whether Musk would have "unilateral control" over any for-profit entity created to fund the nonprofit, trial evidence showed.

Their disagreements led Musk to resign from the board in February 2018, but he wrote that he would continue to pay its rent and support the nonprofit "in spirit." Musk's counsel argued that within months, Altman and Brockman created the for-profit and cut a series of deals with Microsoft totaling $13 billion that stripped the nonprofit of meaningful resources, while allowing Brockman to obtain a $30 billion equity stake.

Meanwhile, Altman served as CEO of both the for-profit and nonprofit while owning stakes worth more than $1.65 billion in companies like Helion Energy and Cerebras, which have since entered into multibillion-dollar deals with OpenAI, according to Musk's counsel and trial evidence.

Musk claimed that it wasn't until late 2022 that he realized Altman and Brockman had breached the charitable trust after Microsoft announced its $10 billion deal with OpenAI, the largest investment in the AI startup to that point. Musk's counsel noted that the deal also gave Microsoft access to OpenAI's intellectual property and a larger, long-term stake in OpenAI, which grew by 20% annually.

Musk's counsel additionally pointed to Altman and Brockman's temporary ouster from the OpenAI nonprofit board in November 2023 for their lack of candor, and Microsoft's role in their reinstatement, as further evidence that the executives were dishonest and no longer serving the nonprofit's charitable mission.

In their defense, Altman and Brockman argued that Musk's lawsuit was driven by the billionaire's desire to suppress AI competition, and by his sour grapes over his rebuffed efforts to control the now hugely successful AI company.

Both OpenAI executives, as well as Microsoft's counsel, argued that Musk's claims are rooted in donations he made years ago, and that those donations were spent years before the three-year statute of limitations expired.

Defense attorneys also argued that Musk's donations weren't specific enough to create a charitable trust under the law. They repeatedly pointed to the roughly $200 billion current valuation of the OpenAI nonprofit's stake in the for-profit, and argued that the nonprofit is one of the most well-funded nonprofits in the world.

On Monday, the jury agreed with OpenAI.

Musk said in a statement Monday that the judge and jury never ruled on the merits of the case, and instead "just on a calendar technicality."

"There is no question to anyone following the case in detail that Altman and Brockman did in fact enrich themselves by stealing a charity," Musk said. "The only question is WHEN they did it!"

Musk added that he plans to appeal to the Ninth Circuit, "because creating a precedent to loot charities is incredibly destructive to charitable giving in America."

Microsoft said in a statement Monday that the company welcomes the jury's decision and remains committed to its work with OpenAI.

Representatives for OpenAI didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

Throughout the trial, the parties accused each other of not caring enough about AI safety, but Judge Gonzalez Rogers repeatedly prohibited the parties from offering evidence on the issue or arguing at length about it, and she refused to let counsel respond to questions raised by jurors about AI safety.

The judge also commented outside the presence of the jury that the "entire trial is a gigantic irony," and she observed that it is ironic that despite the safety risks that Musk alleges OpenAI's for-profit structure creates, Musk is currently creating his own for-profit company, xAI Corp., which is "in the exact space."

She added, however, that this trial is not about AI safety risks or whether AI damages humanity. Rather, the trial concerns an alleged breach of charitable trust, and although there may be a trial in a federal court one day over AI damaging humanity, "that is not this trial," she said.

Musk is represented by Steven F. Molo, Jennifer Schubert, Eric R. Nitz, Sara Tofighbakhsh, Walter H. Hawes IV, Alexandra C. Eynon and Robert K. Kry of MoloLamken LLP and Marc Toberoff of Toberoff & Associates PC.

The OpenAI parties are represented by Jordan Eth, William Frentzen, David Wiener and Camila Tapernoux of Morrison Foerster LLP and Randall Jackson, Bradley R. Wilson and Sarah K. Eddy of Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz.

Microsoft is represented by Russell P. Cohen, Nisha Patel Gupta and John A. Jurata Jr. of Dechert LLP.

The case is Musk v. Altman et al., case number 4:24-cv-04722, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

--Editing by Daniel King.

Update: This article was updated to include additional details on the judge's dismissal of the claims, the statements from Musk and Microsoft, as well as additional counsel information for OpenAI.

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