Apple and OpenAI’s Trade-Secrets Fight Is Now Set for 2027 Trial
Apple and OpenAI’s Trade-Secrets Fight Is Now Set for 2027 Trial
Apple’s trade-secrets battle with OpenAI began with allegations aimed at two former Apple employees, Chang Liu and Tang Tan, who later joined the ChatGPT maker. Apple says they carried confidential information about its unreleased technologies, processes and products into work that could advance OpenAI’s hardware ambitions.
The complaint focuses in part on Liu’s alleged access to Apple systems after his departure. Apple claims he did not return a company computer, used an authentication weakness to reach cloud storage and downloaded confidential files. It also alleges that Tan sought confidential details during recruitment conversations with Apple employees. Apple subsequently asked for a preliminary injunction that would bar Liu, Tan and OpenAI from accessing, acquiring, using or disclosing the disputed material while the litigation proceeds.
OpenAI answered not only in court-facing language but in public, publishing messages and emails under the headline “Apple is getting this wrong.” The company called Apple’s injunction request “based on false information” and “completely unnecessary,” arguing that it does not possess — or want — Apple trade secrets. It says Liu’s supposed residual access reflected Apple’s failure to promptly remove former employees’ system permissions, rather than an effort to obtain information, and maintains that Tan has made clear that OpenAI must not use other companies’ confidential material.
That rebuttal sharpens the central divide: Apple portrays the episode as deliberate misuse of protected corporate knowledge; OpenAI depicts it as an aggressive reading of messy offboarding and recruitment records. OpenAI also says Apple’s outside lawyers initially contacted the wrong person, further challenging Apple’s account of attempted outreach.
The dispute now has a fixed destination. A judge has scheduled the trial to begin on July 19, 2027, setting up a lengthy wait before Apple’s allegations and OpenAI’s denials receive a full courtroom test.
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