According to news on July 12, Apple’s trade secret case against OpenAI has more specific and dramatic details. According to Bloomberg, Apple claimed in the complaint that former iPhone engineer Chang Liu still had access to Apple’s internal network storage after he left his job to join the OpenAI hardware department. He wrote in a message to his former colleague Alyssa Peng: "It's so funny that I found out that I still have access." Apple said that Liu Chang then used this access to download presentations, hardware design, manufacturing details and testing processes.
This is still an accusation made by Apple and has not yet been determined by the court. But it changed the accusation from a vague "trade secrets stolen" to a specific story: OpenAI is moving from a software company to consumer hardware. Apple suspects that OpenAI is relying on former Apple employees and related information to quickly copy a consumer hardware development system.
More than just a retired engineer
According to the complaint cited by Bloomberg, Liu Chang did not return the company's MacBook when he left Apple, maintained close contact with a colleague who was still working at Apple, and mastered an authentication vulnerability that allowed him to continue to access Apple's internal file servers. Apple said the colleague later helped him obtain more information and joined the OpenAI hardware department in April this year.
Liu Chang is just the tip of the iceberg. Apple said OpenAI encourages job candidates who are still working at Apple to research confidential materials before interviews and even bring hardware components and prototypes to OpenAI offices for presentation. Apple also alleged that there was a list compiled by Tang Tan within OpenAI to help new employees transfer information from Apple devices to personal mailboxes before leaving, in order to avoid detection by Apple's security team.
OpenAI denies knowingly obtaining other people’s trade secrets. A company spokesperson responded to Bloomberg saying that OpenAI "has no intention of obtaining other companies' trade secrets" and said the company remains focused on building innovative technologies.
What Apple is really worried about: The hardware development system is copied as a whole
The lawsuit is sensitive not just because a few employees jumped ship. Apple said in the complaint that OpenAI currently employs more than 400 former Apple employees. Bloomberg reports that these people are attracted by the opportunities of next-generation AI equipment, higher salaries and stock options.
What Apple cares most about is whether OpenAI is quickly replicating its own consumer electronics product development system.
Tang Tan has worked at Apple for about 25 years, participating in and leading product design such as Mac notebooks, iPods, iPhones and Apple Watches. After leaving Apple, he co-founded io Products with former Apple executives such as Jony Ive and Evans Hankey, and promoted AI hardware projects with Altman. OpenAI acquired the company last year in a $6.5 billion all-stock deal.
Apple's concern is that OpenAI is poaching not just individual engineers, but a complete set of capabilities consisting of design, engineering, supply chain and unreleased product experience.
The fight is not for ChatGPT to connect to Siri, but for the next screen after the mobile phone.
Bloomberg said that OpenAI is developing an AI-driven smartphone replacement, but the first product may be simpler; the company has also explored forms such as headphones, smart glasses, and AI speakers. Apple is developing new home devices, AirPods with cameras, glasses and other wearable devices.
The focus of competition between the two parties has shifted from today's ChatGPT access to Siri to the next headset, the next screen, and even the next portable device after the mobile phone.
The next test is OpenAI’s isolation mechanism.
Apple said that it contacted OpenAI in February this year, hoping that the other party would investigate whether Apple's confidential information entered its hardware projects and prevent similar situations from happening again; Apple also said that OpenAI did not respond. A few months later, Apple formally filed a lawsuit.
The key next step is not how many dramatic details Apple can tell, but whether it can prove that this information actually entered OpenAI's hardware development process. For OpenAI, what really needs to be proven is whether there is a clear enough separation between the experience brought by former Apple employees and protected trade secrets.
AIHardware competition has just started, and it has already encountered the most sensitive part of consumer electronics.
Software companies can recruit people with high salaries, but consumer electronics cannot be made just by relying on ideas and models. Product definition, material technology, manufacturing processes, reliability testing and supply chain management are all advantages that Apple has accumulated over a long period of time. Once these capabilities begin to flow to OpenAI on a large scale, the boundary between talent flow and commercial secrets will be repeatedly stretched.
For Apple, this lawsuit is a reminder to OpenAI: AI devices can be reimagined, but they cannot start directly based on Apple’s internal data. For OpenAI, before its hardware ambitions have truly come to fruition, it has already entered the most difficult battlefield in the consumer electronics industry.