AppleInsider reports that Craig Federighi is now part of xAI’s antitrust lawsuit against Apple and OpenAI, while Tim Cook apparently isn’t. The suit claims Apple’s alleged partnership with OpenAI has rigged App Store rankings to favor ChatGPT over Grok and X.
This is exactly the kind of legal fishing expedition you’d expect from Musk at this point. The premise is that Apple’s integration of ChatGPT features into iOS somehow constitutes antitrust behavior that keeps Grok from the top of search results. Never mind that App Store rankings are driven by downloads, ratings, and engagement metrics that Apple publishes. Never mind that Grok’s obscurity might have more to do with it being bundled into a platform most people associate with unhinged rants and Nazi spam. No, clearly the issue is a secret conspiracy.
Federighi makes sense as a target if you’re trying to prove Apple manipulated its own algorithms. He oversees iOS, App Store policies, and the technical implementation of features like Apple Intelligence. If there’s a smoking gun email about juicing ChatGPT’s placement, it would probably pass through his org. The fact that Cook isn’t involved suggests xAI’s lawyers think this is a technical matter, not a boardroom handshake deal. That’s either smart targeting or an admission they don’t have evidence of executive-level collusion.
The timing matters too. Apple announced its OpenAI partnership at WWDC 2024, integrated ChatGPT into iOS 18.2 in December, and got sued eight months later. Musk has spent that entire period complaining on X about how Apple is sabotaging him, so this lawsuit reads less like antitrust enforcement and more like using the courts as a PR platform. Discovery will be a nightmare for Apple either way, but unless xAI can prove Apple actively suppressed Grok in ways that violate competition law, this is just expensive noise.
Federighi’s going to have a fun deposition either way. Let’s see if Musk’s lawyers can explain why a chatbot nobody uses deserves top billing.
Reporting reference: AppleInsider ↗