Apple has formally replied in court to a lawsuit brought by Elon Musk and his company xAI alleging anticompetitive behavior in Apple's decision to partner with xAI competitor OpenAI.

Elon Musk's war with OpenAI has several fronts, one of which is an August lawsuit in which xAI is suing Apple for partnering with OpenAI, and for allegedly ranking OpenAI's ChatGPT higher in the Apple App store than Grok — which, if we had to guess, is based on actual popularity?

The lawsuit claimed that Apple had joined forces with OpenAI "in a desperate bid to protect its smartphone monopoly," and accused OpenAI of trying to establish its own monopoly in the chatbot realm. Musk's suit says that OpenAI is "the company that most benefits from inhibiting competition and innovation in AI," and OpenAI responded calling the suit part of Musk's "ongoing pattern of harassment."

Separately, Musk and OpenAI are engaged in another lawsuit, after OpenAI accused Musk of a deliberate campaign to sabotage and undermine the company — which he helped to cofound and then became estranged from. That suit cites Musk's likely disingenuous offer to buy OpenAI in February for $97.4 billion, widely considered a gross under-valuation.

On Tuesday, as Bloomberg reports, Apple made a court filing in Texas in which the company said it had done nothing wrong in partnering with OpenAI, and that Musk's claims of antitrust injury were based on "speculation on top of speculation."

Apple's filing also contends that it is "widely known that Apple intends to partner with other generative AI chatbots" besides ChatGPT.

And it suggests that Apple would need, under Musk's suit's logic, to "simultaneously" partner with "every other generative AI chatbot—regardless of quality, privacy or safety considerations, technical feasibility, stage of development, or commercial terms."

"Of course, the antitrust laws do not require that," Apple's attorneys write.

Apple is seeking a complete dismissal of the suit.

Previously: Elon Musk and xAI Sue Apple and OpenAI Claiming Anticompetitive Scheme