Competition in the AI ​​sector is heating up, and this is driving the issue of personnel transfers between companies. Elon Musk’s xAI startup has filed a lawsuit alleging that a Chinese engineer working in a key position at Grok AI acquired trade secrets and transferred to rival company OpenAI.

Elon Musk sues former engineer

The lawsuit alleges that the software engineer in question joined the xAI team early last year and played a key role in training the Grok model. It is alleged that the employee, who was one of the original engineers and had extensive access to the project, used this authority to steal critical trade secrets. It is also alleged that the engineer sold $7 million in xAI stock during this process.

According to xAI’s claim, the engineer initially admitted to stealing the secrets in a meeting. However, later examination of his computer revealed that he had taken more documents with him. The company argues that these trade secrets contain information about Grok’s advanced training processes, which would have provided OpenAI with significant time and cost savings.

xAI is demanding compensation for damages and the engineer’s ban from working at OpenAI. This lawsuit highlights the current state of information theft and competition between companies in the field of artificial intelligence. The question of whether former employees should have limited access to critical information, in particular, has become a frequently discussed topic as a result of such lawsuits.

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