Musk says xAI to take legal action against Apple over App Store rankings

Elon Musk’s AI company xAI is publicly threatening to take legal action against Apple, accusing the tech giant of anticompetitive behavior related to App Store rankings. Musk alleges that Apple has been manipulating its App Store curation and ranking system to favor OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot over xAI’s direct competitor, Grok. According to Musk, this manipulation effectively blocks Grok and potentially other competing AI products from reaching top visibility or prominent placement in the App Store, despite strong user interest and downloads.

Here is the key points of the dispute include:

• Musk has accused Apple of a clear antitrust violation by giving preferential treatment through rankings to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which holds the No. 1 spot in the U.S. App Store, while Grok is lower ranked, around 5th or 6th place.
• Musk questioned why Apple refuses to feature xAI’s apps (Grok and Musk’s news app X) in the “Must Have” section of the App Store, despite their large user base.
• The allegation centers on platform discrimination and abuse of Apple’s market power as the gatekeeper for app distribution on iOS devices.
• This dispute comes amid Apple’s expanding partnership with OpenAI, integrating ChatGPT deeply into Apple devices, which Musk ties to the alleged favoritism.
• Musk publicly declared on his social platform X that xAI will take “immediate legal action” if the situation is not addressed.
• Apple is expected to defend itself by saying that its app rankings are based on neutral criteria like downloads, engagement, and quality control.
• The conflict is occurring against a broader backdrop of regulatory scrutiny and legal challenges to Apple’s App Store practices globally.
• OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has responded by accusing Musk of manipulating his own social platform to harm competitors, intensifying the rivalry.

As of now, no formal lawsuit has been filed, but the public threat of litigation and regulatory interest could escalate the situation quickly. In summary, the xAI vs Apple dispute is about Musk accusing Apple of unfairly favoring OpenAI’s AI chatbot through rigid App Store ranking policies, potentially breaching antitrust laws, which Musk claims stifles competition for his AI offerings.