Startups

Musk v. Altman is just getting started

Theresa Loconsolo

7:00 AM PDT · May 1, 2026

37 min

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Elon Musk spent the better part of three days on the witness stand this week in his lawsuit against OpenAI, and it’s already getting messy. Emails, texts, and his own tweets are surfacing in court, and there are plenty more witnesses to come. Musk’s argument against OpenAI? By converting the company to a for-profit model, Sam Altman betrayed the “nonprofit for the benefit of humanity” mission Musk signed up to fund. As Musk keeps reminding the courtroom: “You can’t steal a charity.”

Watch as this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast discusses what’s actually at stake in the courtroom and what to watch for as Altman and others take the stand, plus deals, defense tech, and what Big Tech’s earnings week revealed about the limits of the AI spending era.

Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.

Topics

Acquisitions, AI, ai infrastructure, Amazon, big tech earnings, Elon Musk, Google, Meta, Microsoft, military AI, OpenAI, sallie mae, sam altman, Scout AI, Startups

Theresa Loconsolo

Audio Producer

Theresa Loconsolo is an audio producer at TechCrunch focusing on Equity, the network’s flagship podcast. Before joining TechCrunch in 2022, she was one of 2 producers at a four-station conglomerate where she wrote, recorded, voiced and edited content, and engineered live performances and interviews from guests like lovelytheband. Theresa is based in New Jersey and holds a bachelors degree in Communication from Monmouth University.

You can contact or verify outreach from Theresa by emailing theresa.loconsolo@techcrunch.com.

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