The drive images are already promised. OpenAI has agreed to hand over forensic copies of the hard drives of fourteen employees who left Apple for the rival lab, part of a voluntary concession issued as its trade secrets fight with the iPhone maker entered open court.
The retreat came at the eleventh hour. US District Judge Edward Davila had just signaled he was “highly likely” to grant Apple’s request for an injunction, The Verge reported on October fifteen, twenty twenty-six. Rather than wait to lose the motion, OpenAI conceded: it will not use Apple’s proprietary information for product development while the lawsuit runs.
Bloomberg first carried the agreement.
The stakes are plain enough. Apple sued after a cluster of engineers and scientists defected to OpenAI, accusing the chatbot maker of building on confidential silicon and product know-how that departed staff carried with them. Fourteen of those former Apple employees now sit at the center of the evidence fight, their computers about to become exhibits.
An injunction, had Davila granted one, would have ordered the same restraint by court command. The voluntary route lets OpenAI frame the limit as its own choice while the underlying case proceeds toward trial.
Neither Apple nor OpenAI commented beyond the filing. The litigation continues.
