Did Shivon Zillis, mother of Musk’s 4 children, operate as his insider at OpenAI?

The blockbuster OpenAI trial in an Oakland, California, federal court has pitted the world's richest man, Elon Musk, against OpenAI's CEO, Sam Altman, and its co-founder and President, Greg Brockman.

At the centre of the trial is Shivon Zilis, mother of Musk’s kids. She is being painted as Musk's inside source while serving on the artificial intelligence giant’s board.

In 2015, Musk co-founded OpenAI as a nonprofit with Altman and a group of AI researchers; however, he later left the company amid a power struggle with Altman. OpenAI's Altman and the other founders later added a for-profit company to the AI lab, paving the way to raise billions of dollars in funding.

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The Tesla boss, who sued OpenAI two years ago, accused the company of breaching its founding contract, and is now seeking $150 billion (around Rs 12.6 lakh crore) in damages. He also wants the court to remove Altman and Brockman from the company.

To which, OpenAI argues that Musk was aware of the plan to shift toward a for-profit structure and had even supported the move before leaving the company.

We take a look.

How Zilis funnelled info to Musk while being at OpenAI

Zilis began working for OpenAI as an adviser in 2016. During which, she had friendly relations with Altman and Brockman. Also, she was involved in a romantic relationship with Musk at the same time, according to Zilis' testimony.

Zilis previously worked for Tesla and is currently an executive at Musk’s brain implant company Neuralink.

Zilis was questioned about whether she passed information to Musk, who left OpenAI in 2018, while sitting on the company's board.

OpenAI’s lawyers have painted her as Musk's woman inside OpenAI. Lawyers claim that Tesla's CEO was well aware of what was happening at the AI lab, and that it was Zilis who kept him well informed.

The New York Times (NYT) reported, citing evidence from the trial, that Musk left OpenAI in 2018; however, he wanted Zilis to stay on board so she could keep him posted on the company's ongoing work. Musk reportedly also discussed with her about poaching OpenAI staff for Tesla.

Then came the bombshell text exchange between Musk and Zilis.

OpenAI’s lawyer Sarah Eddy asked Zilis what she meant in a text exchange that she had with Musk: "Do you prefer I stay close and friendly with OpenAI to keep info flowing or begin to disassociate? Trust game is about to get tricky so any guidance for how to do right by you is appreciated."

Musk responded: "Close and friendly, but we are going to actually try to move three or four people from OpenAI to Tesla. More than that will join over time, but we won’t actively recruit them."

When questioned about the exchange while testifying, Musk asserted he “wanted to know what was going on.”

During the testimony on Wednesday (May 6), Zilis told Eddy, "Musk and OpenAI were going through a weird half-breakup. I wanted to help both parties maintain max alignment," The New York Post (NYP) reported.

Zilis further described the text exchange as “just trying to get a read on where his (Musk) head was at.”

Did Zilis update Musk on OpenAI’s fundraising efforts?

In an email from April 23, 2018, Zilis updated Musk on OpenAI’s fundraising efforts and on progress toward developing an AI capable of playing video games.

She also said in the same text that she shifted most of her time away from OpenAI to Musk's other firms Neuralink and Tesla; however, Zilis told him: "If you’d prefer I pull more hours back to OpenAI oversight please let me know," Wired reported.

At the same time, she continued to act as a trusted confidant to both sides. She acted as a liaison between Musk and OpenAI's leaders for years.

When Tesla CEO testified on May 6, he said that Zilis never shared or disclosed any confidential information about OpenAI to him without proper authorisation.

What Zilis said about her pregnancy

While testifying on Tuesday (May 5), Brockman said that when Zilis joined OpenAI, many within the company were wary of her, but he trusted her to maintain a separation between her work with Musk and her role at OpenAI.

While serving on the board, Zilis was pregnant, but she did not tell Brockman that Musk was the father. Brockman claimed he learned that Musk was the father from news reports.

When Brockman asked Zilis about the reports, she said she had conceived through in vitro fertilisation and described her relationship with Musk as platonic.

Zilis said she initially kept Musk’s paternity confidential to protect the children from security risks, but informed OpenAI’s board after a news story broke in 2022.

According to her testimony, as reported by the NYP, Musk offered to donate sperm to Zilis around 2020 as he wanted people around him to have more children.

Did Zilis advise Altman on his relationship with Musk?

Testimony and reports show that Zilis was not just informing Musk about work at OpenAI but also advising Altman on how to manage his relationship with the SpaceX owner.

On October 23, 2022, Altman received an angry message from Musk after learning that OpenAI was raising fresh funding from Microsoft at a $20 billion valuation. Altman later shared a screenshot of the text with Zilis, seeking her advice on how to respond.

To which Zilis said, “Call if you’d like additional context, but overall recommendation is don’t text back

immediately."

On February 9, 2023, shortly after Musk had purchased Twitter, Altman again messaged Zilis, asking, “Good idea for me to tweet something nice about Elon?"

And a few days later, Altman posted on X, “Society underestimates how much it owes Elon for raising the collective ambition level at a time when optimism for the future was receding.” This showed how Zilis managed both sides, until she stepped down in 2023.

Last week, when Musk testified, he said that he lives with Zilis and publicly refers to her as his “partner.”

With inputs from agencies