Elon Musk Testifies Under Oath That xAI Used OpenAI's Models to Train Grok via Distillation

TechCrunch / Hacker News·high signal

During federal testimony on April 30, Elon Musk confirmed that xAI used OpenAI's models to train Grok through model distillation — directly undermining his years-long legal and public campaign accusing OpenAI of violating its nonprofit mission. The admission came during the ongoing OpenAI v. Musk trial and has been widely covered by TechCrunch, The Verge, Decrypt, and others. The irony is sharp: Musk sued OpenAI partly over concerns about closed-source AI, while his own company extracted knowledge from those same closed models.