Apple sues OpenAI over alleged hardware trade-secret theft

Apple filed a lawsuit on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing OpenAI and two former Apple employees of stealing hardware trade secrets and accessing company systems without authorization.

The complaint names former senior systems electrical engineer Chang Liu, former iPhone and Apple Watch design executive Tang Yew Tan, OpenAI Foundation, OpenAI Group PBC and io Products as defendants.

The filing states Liu left Apple in January after eight years, did not return a company laptop and later used an authentication bug to access Apple’s shared network folders while employed at OpenAI. The complaint states: “While employed by OpenAI, Mr. Liu also exploited a rare, previously unknown authentication bug to access Apple’s shared network folders. Upon discovering that he had this unauthorized access to Apple’s systems, Mr. Liu did not report it, return his stolen Apple-issued work laptop, or delete the program that allowed the access.” The complaint alleges he downloaded dozens of confidential hardware files, including information on unreleased products, engineering presentations, technical specifications and proprietary project data.

The filing alleges Tang, who spent 24 years at Apple and joined OpenAI as chief hardware officer, used confidential information from his time at Apple to benefit OpenAI. The complaint says he used Apple internal project names during interviews and questioned candidates about unreleased products.

The complaint also describes recruiting materials and interview requests that it says sought design files and supplier information. The filing alleges OpenAI requested “CAD/design artifacts,” prototypes, supplier details and descriptions of employees’ work on Apple hardware, and that some candidates were asked to bring “actual parts” for “show and tell.”

Apple links the allegations to OpenAI’s consumer hardware work after its acquisition of io Products, a hardware startup founded by former Apple designer Jony Ive, in a transaction the filing values at roughly $6.4 billion. The filing says OpenAI’s hardware division has hired more than 400 former Apple employees. Ive is not named in the lawsuit.

The filing says Apple raised concerns with OpenAI in February about confidential information entering the company and did not receive a response. The complaint seeks damages and injunctive relief for alleged theft of trade secrets and unauthorized access to Apple systems.

The lawsuit follows an earlier, separate trade-secret dispute involving OpenAI that a judge dismissed for failure to show inducement to disclose confidential information. Apple and OpenAI previously worked on integrating ChatGPT into Apple’s Siri, and Apple later selected Google’s Gemini to power its next generation of AI models.

Neither Apple nor OpenAI has issued a public statement beyond the documents filed in court.