Elon Musk’s Last-Ditch Effort to Control OpenAI: Recruit Sam Altman to Tesla

A striking development has emerged in artificial intelligence. Maxwell ZeffParesh DaveBusinessMay 6, 2026 7:23 PMElon Musk’s Last-Ditch Effort to Control OpenAI: Recruit Sam Altman to TeslaMessages between Shivon Zilis and Tesla executives reveal plans in 2017 to start a rival AI lab, potentially led by Altman or Demis Hassabis. Photo-Illustration: WIRED Staff; Mike Windel/Getty Images Save this story Save this storyA few months before Elon Musk left OpenAI’s board of directors in February 2018, he tried to recruit Sam Altman to join a “world-class AI lab” within Tesla. Musk went as far as offering the OpenAI CEO a Tesla board seat, according to emails and testimony presented in federal court on Wednesday during the Musk v.

The emails were shown to a jury during the cross examination of Shivon Zilis, a former OpenAI adviser and board member who is also the mother of four of Musk’s children. Musk’s core claim in this lawsuit is that Altman and OpenAI president Greg Brockman effectively stole a nonprofit, using the $38 million Musk invested to create a private company worth more than $800 billion today. On Wednesday, lawyers for Musk showed video depositions of former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati and former OpenAI board member Helen Toner, to raise concerns over Altman’s alleged history of deceit.

Technical Details

OpenAI’s legal team has responded to Musk’s claims by questioning his true motives, arguing that the Tesla CEO has had “sour grapes” ever since he failed to assume control of OpenAI in 2017. He has since started a rival, for-profit AI lab. OpenAI’s lawyers used Zilis’ cross-examination on Wednesday to bring up evidence about Musk’s alleged plans to subvert OpenAI, and tried to suggest Zilis was privy to those plans.

As it pertains to this case, one of Zilis’ most important roles at OpenAI was acting as a conduit between Musk and Altman. In a text from February 2018 presented as evidence, Zilis—then an OpenAI adviser, as well as a Neuralink and Tesla executive—asked Altman, “Did you think through a B Corp subsidiary of Tesla? ”“There was documentary evidence that, at several points, Mr.

Musk had contemplated seeking to join Sam Altman to the board and offered that option,” said OpenAI lawyer William Savitt outside the courthouse on Wednesday. Musk’s effort to corrupt OpenAI and absorb it into Tesla … he was trying to get Altman to abandon the mission and be part of Tesla. ”Are you a current or former OpenAI or Tesla employee who wants to talk about what's happening?

Industry Implications

We'd like to hear from you. Using a nonwork phone or computer, contact the reporters securely on Signal at Mzeff. In an email to Tesla’s VP of communications, Sarah O'Brien, from November 2017, Zilis shared a draft of an FAQ page about an event Tesla was planning to hold at the NeurIPS AI conference.

“The purpose of this event is to share that Tesla is building a world leading AI lab(? ) which will rival the likes of Google / DeepMind and Facebook AI Research,” the drafted FAQ read.

This advance offers important signals about the future of the sector, and the tech world is watching closely.