Apple Lawsuit Filing Accuses OpenAI of Stealing Trade Secrets

Apple filed a trade secrets lawsuit against OpenAI on Friday in a California federal court, accusing the AI company of poaching former Apple employees who then handed over confidential hardware designs. The apple lawsuit filing marks a stunning breakdown between two companies that had been working together on Siri upgrades just last year.

At a Glance

Apple filed suit in California federal court, alleging a coordinated pattern of trade secret theft.
Two former Apple employees, Tang Tan and Chang Liu, are named as defendants alongside OpenAI.
Tan is now OpenAI's chief hardware officer; he previously helped design the iPhone, Apple Watch and iPod.
The suit also names io Products, the hardware startup OpenAI bought for nearly 6.5 billion dollars.
OpenAI has said it plans consumer hardware by the end of this year, according to its CFO.

What Apple's Filing Actually Claims

Apple's complaint describes what it calls a coordinated pattern of misconduct at an institutional level, arguing that former employees stole trade secrets specifically to benefit OpenAI's hardware ambitions. The filing states plainly that the case centers on Apple's former staff taking Apple's secrets for OpenAI's gain, and that Apple is suing to stop it.

Chang Liu, an electrical engineer who left Apple earlier this year, is accused of downloading confidential hardware files onto an Apple issued device he kept after his departure. Tang Tan, who now runs hardware at OpenAI, allegedly told job candidates still employed at Apple to bring actual parts from Apple with them to their OpenAI interviews. Apple says it opened an internal investigation and found what it describes as a pattern of theft among former staff who moved to OpenAI.

OpenAI's Secret Device Under Scrutiny

OpenAI has never disclosed exactly what it is building, describing the project only as a search for a new way to interact with AI beyond traditional screens and interfaces. The idea echoes what Amazon and Google did a decade ago with screen free smart speakers, except this time the ambition is reportedly bigger and more personal.

Apple's lawsuit argues the entire hardware effort is compromised from the start. The filing claims OpenAI's hardware business rests on the shakiest of foundations because of what Apple calls its illegal reliance on stolen trade secrets. Apple says it first flagged concerns to OpenAI back in February, early in its investigation, but never got a response.

A smartphone resting on a desk near design sketches and small hardware prototypes.

From Partners to Rivals

Apple turned to OpenAI a few years ago after falling behind in the AI race that ChatGPT kicked off. In 2024 the two companies struck a deal letting iPhone users tap ChatGPT as a fallback answer engine whenever Siri came up short. Since then the relationship has cooled considerably and started looking more like competition than collaboration.

OpenAI's hiring of former Apple design chief Jony Ive accelerated that shift. Ive is leading a project many analysts expect could eventually produce a device that competes directly with Apple's own products. Last year OpenAI revealed it was working secretly with Ive on a new way of interacting with AI, and it acquired io Products, the firm Ive co founded with Tan and two others, in a deal valued at nearly 6.5 billion dollars.

Quick Facts

Apple and OpenAI's ChatGPT integration deal on iPhone dates to 2024.
OpenAI's acquisition of io Products was valued near 6.5 billion dollars.
Apple says it reached out to OpenAI about its concerns in February.
A separate lawsuit from startup iyO Inc. accuses Ive and Sam Altman of trademark infringement over the similar sounding name.

The io Products deal has already drawn legal fire from elsewhere. A lesser known startup called iyO Inc. sued Ive and OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman over trademark infringement, pointing to the similarity between iyO and io as well as prior dealings between the companies. That same lawsuit also targets a former iyO employee accused of leaking a confidential drawing of the startup's unreleased product, and it now includes trade secret claims against Tan as well.

Apple's own filing names io Products as a defendant too, tying the dispute directly into that broader web of litigation. Lawyers who have represented io Products and Tan in the past did not respond to requests for comment on the new suit.

Where OpenAI's Hardware Push Goes From Here

The timing is awkward for OpenAI, which has been weighing a possible move toward going public while fending off rising competition from Anthropic and Google. Earlier this year OpenAI trimmed some side projects to refocus on ChatGPT, but it never dropped the hardware plan. CFO Sarah Friar told the Associated Press in April that consumer hardware would arrive toward the end of this year, a timeline that now unfolds under the shadow of Apple's accusations and whatever a federal judge eventually decides about where those designs actually came from.