Apple has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing the ChatGPT maker of orchestrating a coordinated campaign to steal confidential hardware designs and trade secrets as it builds a competing line of consumer devices. The suit, filed Friday, marks a dramatic collapse in relations between the two companies just two years after they announced a high-profile partnership integrating ChatGPT into Apple's operating system.
The core allegations
Apple's complaint centers on two former employees now at OpenAI. Chang Liu, an eight-year Apple systems electrical engineer, allegedly retained a company-issued laptop after leaving in 2026 and exploited a security bug to access Apple's internal cloud storage, downloading dozens of confidential files on unreleased products, technical specifications and engineering presentations. Apple says Liu also advised Apple employees interviewing at OpenAI on what confidential material to study beforehand.
The suit reserves its sharpest accusations for Tang Tan, OpenAI's chief hardware officer and a 24-year Apple veteran who most recently served as VP of product design for iPhone and Apple Watch. Apple alleges Tan used internal project codenames during OpenAI recruiting sessions, instructed job candidates still employed at Apple to bring "actual parts", batteries, logic boards, chips — to interviews for "show and tell," and circulated an internal Apple offboarding document to coach departing staff on evading exit-security checks. "At every level, from members of its Technical Staff to its Chief Hardware Officer... OpenAI has been stealing Apple's trade secrets," the filing states.
Apple says it raised concerns with OpenAI in February and received no response. It is seeking a court order barring OpenAI from using the material, the return of confidential documents, and evidence preservation.
OpenAI's response
OpenAI has denied wrongdoing, saying in a statement it has "no interest in other companies' trade secrets" and remains focused on "building innovative technology." Jony Ive, whose startup io Products was acquired by OpenAI in 2025 and who now leads its device division, was not named as a defendant.
The case lands as OpenAI prepares for an anticipated IPO and gears up to unveil its first consumer hardware later this year. It also complicates Apple's own AI roadmap: the company's revamped Siri, launching this fall, will run on Google's Gemini models rather than OpenAI's technology, underscoring how far the once-close partnership has unraveled.
