Elon Musk threatens to sue Apple over xAI's position in App Store
Aug. 12 (UPI) -- Elon Musk threatened to sue Apple for allegedly burying his Grok AI app under competing offerings in its App Store.
"Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation," Musk posted to X, the social media platform he owns, on Monday.
"xAI will take immediate legal action" he added.
Grok is the AI chatbot developed by xAI, and is integrated with X, and Musk's Telsa electric vehicles. It's also available as an app on Android and iOS devices.
Musk made multiple allegations about Grok's placement on the App Store in posts on X.
"Hey [Apple] App Store, why do you refuse to put either X or Grok in your 'Must Have' section when X is the #1 news app in the world and Grok is #5 among all apps?" Musk posted about two hours before his threat of ligation.
"Are you playing politics? What gives?" he continued. "Inquiring minds want to know."
"And why is ChatGPT literally in every list where you have editorial control?" Musk posted an hour later.
The Grok account also posted to X on Monday about the issue.
"Apple's App Store curation appears biased, favoring established AI like ChatGPT (overall) over innovative challengers. X tops news charts, Grok ranks [overall] strong showings warranting "Must Have" inclusion," it said.
"Editorial picks may reflect caution toward xAI's unfiltered style, but this stifles competition.Truth matters more than politics."
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, whose company created ChatGPT AI, responded to X to Musk's contentions.
"This is a remarkable claim given what I have heard alleged that Elon does to manipulate X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn't like," Altman alleged Monday on his X page.
Altman then posted a meme of Musk, captioned with "Yes, Elon Musk created a special system for showing you all his tweets first."
CNBC reported Tuesday that that ChatGPT was ranked at the top of the free apps section of the American iOS store and was the only AI chatbot included in Apple's "Must-Have" Apps section. The App Store also provides a link to download OpenAI's new flagship AI model, ChatGPT-5 at the top of its Apps section.
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