Technology May 12, 2026 · 1 min read

Sam Altman says Elon Musk’s mind games were damaging OpenAI

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says Elon Musk did "huge damage" to the culture of the AI startup. During testimony as part of Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI, Altman said Musk required OpenAI president Greg Brockman and former chief scientist Ilya Sutskever to rank researchers by their accomplishments and "tak...

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The Verge
by Emma Roth
Sam Altman says Elon Musk’s mind games were damaging OpenAI
Stylized image of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, seated

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says Elon Musk did "huge damage" to the culture of the AI startup. During testimony as part of Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI, Altman said Musk required OpenAI president Greg Brockman and former chief scientist Ilya Sutskever to rank researchers by their accomplishments and "take a chainsaw through a bunch."

Altman conceded that this was the management style the Tesla CEO was known for, but that it was incompatible with his startup. "I don't think Mr. Musk understood how to run a good research lab," Altman testified when his lawyer, William Savitt, asked about the impact of Musk's departure from OpenAI on morale. "For a …

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This article was originally published by The Verge and written by Emma Roth.

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