Apple vs. OpenAI

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Journal.

Episode: Apple vs. OpenAI
Date: July 15, 2026
Hosts: Ryan Knudsen and Jessica Mendoza
Guest: Rolf Winkler (WSJ Tech Reporter)
Main Theme:
A deep dive into the escalating conflict between Apple and OpenAI, focusing on Apple’s lawsuit alleging theft of trade secrets as OpenAI forays into hardware, potentially threatening Apple’s dominance in consumer devices and the future paradigm of human-computer interaction.

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Episode Overview

The episode explores why OpenAI, known for ChatGPT, is entering the hardware space and how this move has spurred Apple to sue, accusing it of poaching employees and stealing confidential information. The conversation situates this corporate clash in the broader context of platform control, technological disruption, and the next era of AI-powered devices.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why OpenAI is Building Devices

• Control Over Customer Access:
  • Rolf Winkler explains OpenAI’s motivation:

    "If you want to reach consumers today...you have to go through the iPhone...You're in Apple's domain, you're controlled by them, and you're limited in what you can do." (03:29)

  • OpenAI wants independence from Apple’s ecosystem, particularly the App Store fees (15%-30% of app revenue) and operational restrictions.
• Vision of the Future:
  • OpenAI aims to create a family of AI devices that transcend the “age of apps,” inspired by futuristic, always-on AI agents.

2. The Apple Lawsuit – Allegations of Trade Secret Theft

• Employee Poaching and Data Theft:
  • Main target: Chang Lu, ex-Apple junior employee, accused of logging into Apple servers using a colleague’s laptop and downloading confidential files.

    "Lou downloaded, quote, dozens of Apple's confidential hardware related files." (05:34)

  • Another high-profile target: Tang Tan, OpenAI’s Chief Hardware Officer, ex-Apple veteran, accused of encouraging Apple recruits to bring “actual parts” to interviews.

    "...asked job candidates coming from Apple to, quote, bring, quote, actual parts to interviews for, quote, show and tell..." (06:26)

• Potential Legal Impact:
  • Rolf notes the difference between general industry knowledge and explicit data theft:

    "...when you use a laptop to log in as somebody else into another company's servers, that is something that will get a judge fired up." (05:48)

  • Apple hopes to slow OpenAI’s momentum, force a pause for discovery, or even seek injunctive relief if core IP is found stolen.

3. Why the Stakes are So High for Apple

• Platform Disruption Threat:
  • Apple’s dominance in defining human-computer interaction (GUI, smartphone) is threatened by the AI paradigm shift.
  • Analogy to Star Trek’s voice-pinned computer as a vision of seamless AI assistance replacing apps and touchscreens:

    "What if I could just tap my chest and say, computer, book me a car going home, and the computer knows where I live..." (12:17)

• Apple’s AI Weakness:
  • So far, Apple’s devices have relied on external AI (OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini) and it’s lagging in building proprietary large language models.

4. Apple’s Strategic Response – Learning from the Android Example

• Past Mistakes:
  • Comparison to the rise of Android: Apple sued Google too late; the market had already shifted. Now, Apple sues OpenAI pre-product release:

    "Are they [Apple] going after OpenAI a lot sooner? They're going after them before they've even released their product." (14:38)

• Goal:
  • By “throwing sand in the gears,” Apple aims to slow OpenAI down to buy time for its own AI advancements.

5. OpenAI’s Dilemma and Business Stakes

• Monetization Needs:
  • OpenAI’s infrastructure costs are enormous; app subscriptions alone can’t sustain them.

    "Hundreds of billions of dollars, Ryan, hundreds of billions of dollars to build." (15:26)

  • Owning the next user device, if successful, could provide the revenue OpenAI needs.

6. The Next Computing Paradigm – An Open Battlefield

• Inflection Point:
  • Rolf summarizes the stakes:

    "This is the moment where we're going to get to define which company is going to control the next 20 years the way Apple has controlled the last 20." (16:54)

• Other Entrants:
  • Companies like SpaceX/Elon Musk also aim for independent, AI-driven devices, echoing a broad industry movement to bypass Apple’s platform dominance.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Gravity of the Lawsuit:
  • Rolf Winkler:

    "This whole thing is, quote, rotten to its core and built on stolen intellectual property..." (06:49)

• On Device Futurism:
  • Rolf Winkler:

    "What if we just talk to it?" (12:44)

• On Industry Stakes:
  • Rolf Winkler:

    "Apple can't just cede that ground to all these really smart, really well funded guys." (16:08)

• On the Central Question:
  • Rolf Winkler:

    "Maybe it's going to be Apple, but maybe it won't. Maybe it will be one of these other AI companies that gives us the next paradigm in computing." (16:54)

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Important Timestamps

• 03:23 – Why OpenAI is building devices
• 05:15 – Details of Apple’s lawsuit, alleged trade secret theft
• 06:14 – Allegations against Tang Tan and employee hiring practices
• 10:16 – Apple’s history shaping human-computer interaction
• 11:07 – Why Apple feels threatened by OpenAI
• 13:25 – Parallels with Android vs. iPhone era
• 14:38 – Apple’s faster, pre-emptive legal action
• 15:11 – OpenAI’s need for consumer device monetization
• 16:43 – The industry at an inflection point

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Flow & Tone

The hosts maintain a brisk yet explanatory tone, teasing out both the strategic logic and high drama behind the Apple vs. OpenAI lawsuit. The episode weaves history, legal stakes, technological futurism, and business strategy, making clear that the outcome could shape the next era in tech—whether Apple keeps its crown or the age of AI ushers in a new king.

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Summary by The Journal, July 15, 2026 – Podcast Episode: "Apple vs. OpenAI"

Transcript

[Ryan Knudsen]

Last year, OpenAI released a promotional video featuring CEO Sam Altman. I think we have the opportunity here to kind of completely reimagine what it means to use a computer. In it, he's chatting with the famous product designer Jony. I've.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

Sam is a rare visionary.

[Ryan Knudsen]

He shoulders Jony. I've used to be synonymous with Apple, but here he was cozying up with the CEO of OpenAI. Jony is the deepest thinker of anyone I've ever met. What that leads him to be able to come up with is unmatched. This video is kind of a love fest, but it was also an announcement. OpenAI was getting into hardware. It was going to make an AI device. And Jony I've, who spent almost 30 years at Apple, was going to lead the team to do this to basically

[Rolf Winkler]

displace Apple, to create a family of devices that will be built for the age of AI, that will be different from our smartphones. Something new to build our lives around.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Our colleague Rolf Winkler covers the tech industry and he says OpenAI has been hiring a lot of former Apple employees and putting them to work on top secret AI devices. Now Apple is sending OpenAI a warning. On Friday, it filed a lawsuit.

[Rolf Winkler]

In a nutshell, Apple is accusing OpenAI of stealing its trade secrets.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Welcome to the Journal, our show about money, business and power. I'm Ryan Knudsen. It's Wednesday, July 15th. On the show apple vs OpenAI.

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[Ryan Knudsen]

All right, so OpenAI makes a chatbot chatgpt. Why does it want to make a Device?

[Rolf Winkler]

Why does OpenAI want its own family of devices? For a few reasons. One, they want to control their own destiny. Right? If you want to reach consumers today, particularly United States, and the ones that have the most money to spend, the consumers with the biggest wallets, you have to go through the iPhone. You're a tech company. Doesn't matter how big you are, you want to reach your customer base, you have to go through the App Store. And that means you're in Apple's domain, you're controlled by them, and you're limited in what you can do.

[Ryan Knudsen]

And in most cases, apps have to pay Apple a percentage of their revenue,

[Rolf Winkler]

huge amounts of money. And if you're OpenAI, when you download ChatGPT through the app Store and a consumer signs up for a subscription, you pay them between 15 to 30% of your revenue. It's a big chunk of money. They want to have an AI family of devices that are built for the age of AI, that aren't built for the age of apps and app stores.

[Ryan Knudsen]

To get around Apple and gain control of its own destiny, OpenAI set out to make this family of devices. One of the first things it did was acquire Jony I've's startup, which he founded after leaving Apple. And OpenAI didn't stop there. It also started poaching Apple employees directly.

[Rolf Winkler]

The people who are the best at designing hardware work at Apple. They know the best processes, they know the best suppliers. They have the biggest brains for this kind of stuff.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Apple was paying attention to all this and last week it took a swing. So let's talk about this lawsuit now. Walk me through the allegations.

[Rolf Winkler]

So there is a junior employee named Chang Luke who, among other things, left Apple and when he was trying to recruit another friend out of Apple, used that person's laptop to basically log into Apple servers and take material, allegedly.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Apple's lawsuit claims that Lou downloaded, quote, dozens of Apple's confidential hardware related files. It also says Lou coached the former colleague on ways to, quote, avoid trouble with the security team, end quote. When copying the files, when you move

[Rolf Winkler]

from one company to another, you can't be expected to forget things in your own brain. So some of this can get a little, you know, is it theft? Is it not? I don't know. But when you use a laptop to log in as somebody else into another company's servers, that is something that will get a judge fired up. But Apple is saying there's more. Apple's saying it's not just this guy.

[Ryan Knudsen]

The suit also names Tang Tan, OpenAI's chief hardware officer. Tan worked at Apple for 24 years, then went to Jony I've's startup, the one that was later acquired by OpenAI,

[Rolf Winkler]

and they're saying that Tang did things like asked job interviewees, job candidates coming from Apple to, quote, bring, quote, actual parts to interviews for, quote, show and tell, and that this also represents a

[Ryan Knudsen]

breach the lawsuit does not name I've. But it basically takes a shot at the entire OpenAI hardware division.

[Rolf Winkler]

So this whole thing is, quote, rotten to its core and built on stolen intellectual property and spreading doubt about everything that OpenAI is doing here. Because it's all built on our stuff. Right.

[Ryan Knudsen]

While the allegations against Chang Lu sound pretty bad, Rolf says the allegations against Tang Tan might be a little squishier.

[Rolf Winkler]

Well, for instance, when you talk about bringing actual parts to interviews, ask some engineers and they'll say, yeah, that's not uncommon for engineering interviews. That's his resume or her resume. They built stuff. When you interview them, you want to talk to them about what they built, how they built it.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Tan and Liu couldn't immediately be reached for comment. In a statement, a spokesperson for OpenAI said, quote, While we take these allegations seriously, we're not aware of any evidence that this complaint has merit. We believe in fair competition and allowing people the freedom to work wherever they choose. And we're focused on building innovative technology that empowers people everywhere. The company has not yet responded in court. A judge will now evaluate Apple's claim and decide if the case can move forward. If it does, it will eventually lead to a process called discovery, which means Apple will be able to request internal documents from OpenAI and interview OpenAI employees.

[Rolf Winkler]

It's a question whether they've really got all the goods that they say they've got, but they've got enough goods probably to get a judge to give them discovery, which means they can start looking into what OpenAI is doing a little bit to see if OpenAI is, in fact, taking a lot of their intellectual property at minimum. I think what it does is slow them down a little bit, make them think twice about how they're poaching Apple employees, what those employees bring with them.

[Ryan Knudsen]

But if Apple finds more evidence and

[Rolf Winkler]

ultimately wins, and if it turns out that there are Apple trade secrets that are sort of at the core of whatever OpenAI is building, well, then Apple can get injunctive relief. Apple can stop them from developing that thing and slow them down dramatically and say, you can't build that. Right? You can't do that the way we did it.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Coming up, why Apple is so worried about OpenAI foreign.

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[Ryan Knudsen]

For the last 50 years, Apple was the company that defined how humans interacted with computers. From making the home desktop something you had to have, to making the best selling smartphone. They were pioneers.

[Rolf Winkler]

Steve Jobs, he didn't invent the graphical user interface for the mouse, but he popularized it is what it runs on

[Ryan Knudsen]

your imagination. Introducing Macintosh Quadra, the most powerful Macintosh.

[Rolf Winkler]

And then he didn't invent the smartphone, but he certainly changed it entirely and he completely reinvented how we use smartphones.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

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[Ryan Knudsen]

is

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a call on your iPhone.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Why does Apple feel so threatened by OpenAI and by this sort of idea that there could be some other devices? I mean, everybody carries around an iPhone right now.

[Rolf Winkler]

They do, and that's the innovator's dilemma, right? If everybody carries around your device, if you're dominant, well then who's going to replace me?

[Ryan Knudsen]

Who might replace Apple? How about something that's better at AI?

[Rolf Winkler]

So now with AI, there's this next opportunity to redefine how humans interact with the primary computers in their lives. Right. It used to be the desktop on our desk. Now it's the phone in our hands. In the future, who knows what it's going to be, but it could be some agent that we speak to through some different kind of device. You know, a lot of these companies have talked about pins, and so I think about, you know, Star Trek and Jean Luc Picard wearing that thing on his chest and he taps it. Computer, you know, get me whatever. Computer, enhance Image in section 4 Delta.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Computer, freeze. Computer, enhance far left figure and compare.

[Rolf Winkler]

What if the AI could just solve problems for me, you know I just landed at the airport instead of having to open up Uber and open up Lyft and compare prices and enter my address and figure out which car I want. Oh, and is it a personal or a business trip? So which credit card am I picking? What if I could just tap my chest and say, computer, book me a car going home, and the computer knows

[Ryan Knudsen]

where I live, knows that you're coming home from a business trip. So use the work card.

[Rolf Winkler]

Use the work card, all of these things, then it's just much easier. And could you imagine a world where we don't open up apps and type in things on our phone with our thumbs all the time? What if we just talk to it?

[Ryan Knudsen]

The problem for Apple, though, is that it doesn't have a very good large language model. Its AI technology is way behind, so thus far, its devices have been powered by other companies. Chatbots, first OpenAI and now Google's Gemini. And once it became clear that OpenAI wanted to make its own devices, Apple started to take a tough stance and it took a page out of its own playbook.

[Rolf Winkler]

One situation that echoes down from the past is Android, right? Steve Jobs and Apple invented the iPhone and iOS. And Eric Schmidt, Google's then CEO, is working with his people, thinking, we can't cede this to Apple. We can't just give them the mobile revolution and not compete with them for it at least. So they bought a startup called Android and they developed Android into a competing platform.

[Ryan Knudsen]

In 2010, Apple sued Google, claiming Android was created using stolen technology. Apple's then CEO Steve Jobs called it thermonuclear war.

[Rolf Winkler]

But by the time he launched that lawsuit, htc, Samsung, some of these Android players were already selling millions of devices. The horse had left the barn. Android wasn't getting put back in a box. And so the best they could do, more or less, was maybe make them re engineer some features that had been taken from the iPhone, get some monetary damages, but it didn't have a big impact ultimately.

[Ryan Knudsen]

So has Apple learned any lessons from that, that it's maybe applying differently this time?

[Rolf Winkler]

Maybe, because boy, oh boy, are they going after OpenAI a lot sooner. They're going after them before they've even released their product. Can they throw sand in the gears here and slow that down? And all of that gives Apple more time to catch up. And Apple's not asleep here. They're behind in AI, but they're catching up rapidly.

[Ryan Knudsen]

For both Apple and OpenAI, the stakes are huge. OpenAI has spent massive amounts of money building out AI technology and it needs to find ways to make more money.

[Rolf Winkler]

You know, being in the App store selling us ChatGPT subscriptions, that ain't going to cut it long term. That's not going to pay for all of these servers, all these data.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Billions and billions of dollars that they're spending.

[Rolf Winkler]

Hundreds of billions of dollars, Ryan, hundreds of billions of dollars to build. They need a bigger strategy. And at least on the consumer side of it, that's going to revolve around devices. If what they're planning works and if they could get a device out the door, that really does change how consumers operate in the world, really changes fundamentally what device we need to carry and we all need to buy that device, well, then that consumer strategy could certainly pay off.

[Ryan Knudsen]

And for Apple, it means either being part of the future or being disrupted.

[Rolf Winkler]

We had a good story a few weeks ago about SpaceX prototyping an AI like device that we would just talk to. Just like OpenAI wants to change the device paradigm. Elon Musk has always bristled at kind of having to go through Apple, right? For X, for various. Anytime he's had a consumer app, that's something he doesn't like. He wants to control his own device destiny. Just like Sam Altman, Apple can't just cede that ground to all these really smart, really well funded guys.

[Ryan Knudsen]

It feels like we're like the very beginning of this sort of inflection moment in this there's sort of an undefined future and there's a fight over who's going to get to own it, you said.

[Rolf Winkler]

Exactly. I mean, this is the moment where we're going to get to define which company is going to control the next 20 years the way Apple has controlled the last 20. And maybe it's going to be Apple, but maybe it won't. Maybe it will be one of these other AI companies that gives us the next paradigm in computing.

[Ryan Knudsen]

Before we go, do you work remotely or wish you did? Or are you stuck at home missing out on office culture? We want to hear your thoughts on hybrid work, return to office mandates, and how you're navigating the two. Send us a voice memo to thejournalsj.com. That's all for today. Wednesday, July 15 the Journal is a co production of Spotify and the Wall Street Journal. Additional reporting in this episode by Melissa Corn and Berber Ginn. Thanks for listening.

[Rolf Winkler]

See you tomorrow.