A gaggle of ex-OpenAI staff on Friday filed a proposed amicus brief in assist of Elon Musk in his lawsuit towards OpenAI, opposing OpenAI’s deliberate conversion from a nonprofit to a for-profit company.
The temporary, filed by Harvard regulation professor and Inventive Commons founder Lawrence Lessig, names 12 former OpenAI staff: Steven Adler, Rosemary Campbell, Neil Chowdhury, Jacob Hilton, Daniel Kokotajlo, Gretchen Krueger, Todor Markov, Richard Ngo, Girish Sastry, William Saunders, Carrol Wainwright, and Jeffrey Wu. It makes the case that, if OpenAI’s non-profit ceded management of the group’s enterprise operations, it will “essentially violate its mission.”
A number of of the ex-staffers have spoken out towards OpenAI’s practices publicly earlier than. Krueger has called on the company to enhance its accountability and transparency, whereas Kokotajlo and Saunders beforehand warned that OpenAI is in a “reckless” race for AI dominance. Wainwright has said that OpenAI “shouldn’t [be trusted] when it guarantees to do the precise factor later.”
In a press release, an OpenAI spokesperson mentioned that OpenAI’s nonprofit “isn’t going wherever” and that the group’s mission “will stay the identical.”
“Our board has been very clear,” the spokesperson instructed TechCrunch through electronic mail. “We’re turning our present for-profit arm right into a public profit company (PBC) — the identical construction as different AI labs like Anthropic — the place a few of these former staff now work — and [Musk’s AI startup] xAI.”
OpenAI was based as a nonprofit in 2015, however it transformed to a “capped-profit” in 2019, and is now making an attempt to restructure as soon as extra right into a PBC. When it transitioned to a capped-profit, OpenAI retained its nonprofit wing, which at present has a controlling stake within the group’s company arm.
Musk’s go well with towards OpenAI accuses the startup of abandoning its nonprofit mission, which aimed to make sure its AI analysis advantages all humanity. Musk had sought a preliminary injunction to halt OpenAI’s conversion. A federal choose denied the request, however permitted the case to go to a jury trial in spring 2026.
In accordance with the ex-OpenAI staff’ temporary, OpenAI’s current construction — a nonprofit controlling a bunch of different subsidiaries — is a “essential half” of its total technique and “essential” to the group’s mission. Restructuring that removes the nonprofit’s controlling function wouldn’t solely contradict OpenAI’s mission and constitution commitments, however would additionally “breach the belief of staff, donors, and different stakeholders who joined and supported the group based mostly on these commitments,” asserts the temporary.
“OpenAI dedicated to a number of key rules for executing on [its] mission of their constitution doc,” the temporary reads. “These commitments had been taken extraordinarily significantly inside the firm and had been repeatedly communicated and handled internally as being binding. The court docket ought to acknowledge that sustaining the nonprofit’s governance is important to preserving OpenAI’s distinctive construction, which was designed to make sure that synthetic normal intelligence advantages humanity relatively than serving slender monetary pursuits.”
Synthetic normal intelligence, or AGI, is broadly understood to imply AI that may full any job a human can.
In accordance with the temporary, OpenAI typically used its construction as a recruitment software — and repeatedly assured workers that the nonprofit management was “essential” in executing its mission. The temporary recounts an OpenAI all-hands assembly towards the top of 2020 throughout which OpenAI CEO Sam Altman allegedly careworn that the nonprofits’ governance and oversight had been “paramount” in “guaranteeing that security and broad societal advantages had been prioritized over short-term monetary beneficial properties.”
“In recruiting conversations with candidates, it was widespread to quote OpenAI’s distinctive governance construction as a essential differentiating issue between OpenAI and opponents similar to Google or Anthropic and an necessary purpose they need to take into account becoming a member of the corporate,” reads the temporary. “This identical purpose was additionally typically used to influence staff who had been contemplating leaving for opponents to remain at OpenAI — together with a few of us.”
The temporary warns that, ought to OpenAI be allowed to transform to a for-profit, it may be incentivized to “[cut] corners” on security work and develop highly effective AI “concentrated amongst its shareholders.” A for-profit OpenAI would have little purpose to abide by the “merge and help” clause in OpenAI’s present constitution, which pledges that OpenAI will cease competing with and help any “value-aligned, safety-conscious” challenge that achieves AGI earlier than it does, asserts the temporary.
The ex-OpenAI staff, a few of whom had been analysis and coverage leaders on the firm, be part of a rising cohort voicing robust opposition to OpenAI’s transition.
Earlier this week, a bunch of organizations, together with nonprofits and labor teams just like the California Teamsters, petitioned California Legal professional Common Rob Bonta to cease OpenAI from changing into a for-profit. They claimed the corporate has “failed to guard its charitable property” and is actively “subverting its charitable mission to advance secure synthetic intelligence.”
Encode, a nonprofit group that co-sponsored California’s ill-fated SB 1047 AI security laws, cited related issues in an amicus temporary filed in December.
OpenAI has mentioned that its conversion would protect its nonprofit arm and infuse it with sources to be spent on “charitable initiatives” in sectors similar to healthcare, schooling, and science. In trade for its controlling stake in OpenAI’s enterprise, the nonprofit would reportedly stand to reap billions of {dollars}.
“We’re truly on the point of construct the best-equipped nonprofit the world has ever seen — we’re not changing it away,” the corporate wrote in a series of posts on X on Wednesday.
The stakes are excessive for OpenAI, which wants to finish its for-profit conversion by the top of this 12 months or subsequent or danger relinquishing a few of the capital it has raised in current months, in response to studies.