Shivon Zilis testifies Musk fathered children as OpenAI ties deepened

Shivon Zilis told a federal courtroom in Oakland that her relationship with Elon Musk began while she was serving on OpenAI’s board, placing one of Musk’s closest executives at the center of his legal fight over the company’s governance and direction.

Zilis said Musk offered to donate sperm when she wanted to become a mother and that she accepted after dealing with health issues and deciding she wanted children as a single mother. She said the initial arrangement was meant to keep Musk’s paternity strictly confidential, and that the relationship later became romantic. Zilis also said Musk is now an active presence in the lives of their four children and that the family spends a few hours together each week.

The testimony carries unusual weight because Zilis is not only the mother of four of Musk’s children but also a longtime executive at Tesla and Neuralink, making her a rare witness with deep ties to Musk’s business empire and to OpenAI’s early inner circle. She said she first met Musk through her OpenAI board role. She also said she did not disclose the twins born in 2021 to OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman at the time because of the confidentiality agreement surrounding the arrangement.

OpenAI lawyers have suggested that Zilis funneled information to Musk, a claim she denied on the stand. That denial matters in a case that turns on whether Musk, who was one of OpenAI’s co-founders, retained influence or access after leaving the board in 2018. NBC News reported that Zilis served on the OpenAI board for several years and left in 2023, after Musk started xAI.

The broader lawsuit centers on Musk’s claim that OpenAI abandoned its original charitable mission when it moved toward a for-profit structure. Musk says he helped fund the company early on and is seeking to reverse that change. With the trial now putting boardroom relationships, personal ties and information flow under a microscope, Zilis’s testimony underscored how the governance battle over OpenAI has reached back into the company’s earliest elite networks.