Musk threatens to sue Apple

(Photo illustration by Cheng Xin/Getty Images)

Elon Musk threatened legal action against Apple on Monday, accusing the company of antitrust violations over how its App Store features Grok, the chatbot created by his xAI startup. The threat appears to have been inspired by the top ranking of OpenAI's ChatGPT, which is run by his former business partner-turned-rival Sam Altman. "Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation," Musk wrote on X. "xAI will take immediate legal action."

"Why do you refuse to put either X or Grok in your 'Must Have' section when X is the #1 news app in the world and Grok is #5 among all apps? Are you playing politics?" he added. The accusation came shortly after Musk touted that Grok had surpassed Google on the App Store.

Apple, which stated that its App Store is "fair and free of bias," rolled out a partnership with OpenAI last year to integrate ChatGPT into its AI features. At the time, Musk said he would ban Apple devices at his companies if "Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level."

Musk cofounded OpenAI with Altman in 2015. Three years later, Musk resigned from the board after failing to gain control of the organization, which he had wanted to merge with Tesla. He then sued OpenAI and Altman last year for allegedly abandoning its founding philanthropic mission. (OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit, but transitioned to a nonprofit-corporate hybrid in 2019.)

Musk's threat against Apple came a few days after he said on X that OpenAI "will eat Microsoft alive." Microsoft is a large OpenAI investor and will integrate ChatGPT-5 into its products. Altman responded to Musk on CNBC, saying that he doesn't "think about [Musk] that much."

In other xAI news:

• Robert Keele, xAI's head of legal affairs, stepped down this week, in part due to differing "worldviews" with Musk. The departure, which Musk has not commented on, came in the wake of numerous xAI controversies, including Grok's repeated praise of Adolf Hitler on X. Taking Keele's place is Lily Lim, a former NASA rocket scientist.

• Igor Babuschkin, an xAI cofounder, announced on Wednesday that he is leaving the company to launch a venture firm. "Today was my last day at xAI, the company that I helped start with Elon Musk in 2023," Babuschkin said. "I still remember the day I first met Elon. We talked for hours about AI and what the future might hold. We both felt that a new AI company with a different kind of mission was needed. Building AI that advances humanity has been my lifelong dream." In response, Musk thanked Babuschkin "for helping build @xAI! We wouldn’t be here without you."

• New reporting from Wired suggests that Grok's "MechaHitler" outburst may have cost xAI a spot in a long-term federal contracting program overseen by the General Services Administration.

• XAI has poached at least 14 researchers and engineers from Meta this year, according to Business Insider.

• The official Grok account on X was temporarily suspended on Monday for reasons that remain unclear, although it may have had to do with the chatbot accusing Israel of committing genocide in Gaza.

SpaceX lashes out at Virginia for prioritizing wired infrastructure over Starlink

Starlink, SpaceX's satellite internet provider, was awarded only a small piece of Virginia's $613 million grant from the federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program. The company responded by accusing the state of bias and waste.

"Simply put, Virginia has put its heavy thumb on the scale in favor of expensive, slow-to-build fiber bias over speedy, low cost, and technology neutral competition," SpaceX wrote in a lengthy letter to state leaders. "Virginia must immediately revise its final proposal to appropriately consider applications received in line with program rules."

Despite higher upfront costs and a lengthy construction schedule, the wired, fiber-optic infrastructure prioritized by Virginia will lead to much faster Internet speeds than Starlink can provide. Traditional internet providers also offer significantly cheaper subscription costs than their satellite counterparts.

In other SpaceX news:

• Donald Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday relaxing environmental rules for commercial rocket launches, a move that will benefit SpaceX.

• SpaceX signed a deal with the Italian Space Agency to transport scientific payloads to Mars, the first commercial deal related to the company's planned Martian missions.

• Starlink officially launched its Internet service in Israel.

Musk kills Tesla supercomputer project

Tesla has reportedly ceased construction of its Dojo supercomputer in Buffalo, New York, after investing at least $314 million in the facility. The stoppage came after Musk confirmed over the weekend that he had the Dojo project "shut down."

A supercomputer custom-built with a combination of Nvidia and proprietary chips, Dojo was launched in 2023 to help train Tesla's in-development autonomous driving and robotics products. It was primarily used to process huge amounts of real-world driving footage from millions of Tesla vehicles.

However, in posts on X Sunday, Musk suggested that Dojo was rendered obsolete by Tesla's upcoming AI6 chips. "Once it became clear that all paths converged to AI6, I had to shut down Dojo and make some tough personnel choices, as Dojo 2 was now an evolutionary dead end," he posted on X. "It doesn't make sense for Tesla to divide its resources and scale two quite different AI chip designs."

Last month, Musk revealed that he had signed a deal with Samsung to manufacture Tesla's AI6 chips, although they remain years away from production. Those chips, according to Musk, will be "pretty good for training" and "excellent for inference" — i.e., real-world AI applications, like the fully autonomous vehicles and humanoid robots that Musk has promised but failed to produce for years.

Numerous veterans of the Tesla Dojo team, including its former leader, recently launched their own AI company.

In other Tesla news:

• To capitalize on the $7,500 EV tax credit before its September 30 expiration, Tesla offered market-leading price cuts and incentives in July, according to Cox Automotive. July was also the second-best month ever for EV sales in the U.S. Due to the increased demand, Tesla was able to raise lease prices for its top-selling Model Y by 14%.

• The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation granted Tesla's Robotaxi division a one-year permit to operate a ride-hailing business using "automated motor vehicles." The company is currently testing a partially automated taxi service in Austin that relies on multiple layers of human oversight and control. Despite these precautions, Tesla's Robotaxi vehicles have been spotted committing numerous dangerous traffic violations, including failing to stop for a closing railroad crossing arm.

• Tesla applied for a regulatory license to begin supplying electricity to homes and businesses in the United Kingdom. The application is tied to the company's growing energy generation and storage business.

Vance wants Elon to reconcile with Trump

Vice President J.D. Vance has implored Musk to patch up his "complicated relationship" with Donald Trump. "My argument to Elon is like, you’re not going to be on the left... even if you wanted to be — and he doesn’t — they’re not going to have you back, that ship has sailed," Vance said in an interview with the Gateway Pundit, a far-right blog. "I really think it's a mistake for him to try to break from the president."

"My hope is, by the midterms, things are kind of back to normal," he added.

Last month, Musk was seemingly on the verge of cementing his split with Trump by forming the America Party. He has threatened to use the party to recruit and fund candidates to challenge Republican lawmakers who voted for Trump's flagship tax-and-spending bill. However, Musk has not taken any formal steps to create the party, despite claiming he would launch it on July 5.

Musk Minutes:

A new analysis from Politico found that the Trump administration's DOGE project, which was primarily led by Musk, saved taxpayers less than 5% of the $52.8 billion it claimed. (Politico)

Sam Altman is preparing to cofound Merge Labs, a brain-computer interface company that will compete directly with Musk's Neuralink. OpenAI will also help fund the startup. (Financial Times)

A federal judge dismissed a request from Musk to toss OpenAI's claim that he has conducted a "years-long harassment campaign" against the organization. (Reuters)

New polling from Gallup suggests that Musk is the most disliked person in the U.S. Among 1,002 American respondents polled between July 7-21, 61% held an unfavorable opinion of Musk. That mark made him significantly less popular than Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the survey's penultimate loser. (Gallup)

After launching less than three weeks ago, the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles has cut its business hours and menu options, including its "all-day breakfast" and "Epic Bacon" offerings. Head chef Eric Greenspan attributed the downsizing to "unprecedented demand." (Eater)

Musk complimented Google's AI development on X, writing, "Outside of real-world AI, Google has the biggest compute (and data) advantage for now, so currently has the highest probability of being the leader. That may change in a few years." (Business Insider)