Elon Musk is suing OpenAI and its chief executive Sam Altman for allegedly abandoning the company’s original mission to develop artificial intelligence for the benefit of humanity not profit.

The lawsuit alleges that Altman and Greg Brockman, co-founder of the artificial intelligence (AI) research organisation, originally approached Musk to make an open source, non-profit company.

The focus of the company, which is behind ChatGPT and is backed by Microsoft, on making money breached that contract, Musk’s lawyers said in the lawsuit filed in San Francisco. 

Claim: Elon Musk co-founded OpenAI in 2015, but stepped down from its board in 2018

They added that the company kept the design of GPT-4, its most advanced AI model, softwarecosmos ‚a complete secret‘.

Musk co-founded OpenAI in 2015, but stepped down from its board in 2018. He also runs electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla and rocket maker Space X and bought Twitter for £35billion in October 2022.

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Last year, entrepreneur Altman was fired by OpenAI’s former board. It said it was trying to defend the company’s mission to develop AI that benefits humanity. A few days later, Altman returned to the company with a new initial board.

OpenAI is planning to appoint several board members in March.

ChatGPT, the chatbot from OpenAI, became the fastest-growing software application in the world within six months of its launch in November 2022.

It also sparked the launch of rival chatbots from Microsoft, Alphabet and a bevy of start-ups which tapped the hype to secure billions in funding.

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