OpenAI has accused a former employee who left for Apple of transferring more than 100 files to a personal account before departing, according to allegations made public in the companies' trade secret dispute. The claim is the central factual assertion in a case that now pits two of the technology sector's largest players against each other over the movement of talent and proprietary information.

Apple has pushed back. The company said it found no evidence to support OpenAI's claim, marking the first formal rebuttal in a dispute that began when Apple brought its trade secret case against OpenAI in July.

What does the allegation actually say?

OpenAI contends the ex-employee sent more than 100 files to a personal account. That figure — 100-plus files — is the only quantified claim disclosed so far, and it anchors the company's argument that sensitive material left its systems alongside the departing staffer.

The employee at the center of the dispute left OpenAI for Apple, a move between two companies competing directly in consumer artificial intelligence. OpenAI has not publicly detailed, in the material available, what the files contained.

The number matters for the legal framing. Transfers of this scale — more than 100 files — are typically presented as evidence of systematic copying rather than incidental retention of work product. Apple's response, that its own review found no supporting evidence, sets up a direct factual clash that a court will have to resolve.

How did Apple respond?

Apple said it found no evidence to support the claim. The statement is the company's first on-the-record position since it filed the trade secret case against OpenAI in July, an unusual posture in which the company pursuing litigation is simultaneously defending its hiring practices.

Apple's position carries two implications:

• The company is standing behind its hiring of the former OpenAI employee, suggesting it sees no internal basis for the allegation.
• It is placing the burden of proof on OpenAI to substantiate both the file-transfer claim and the broader trade secret theory of the case.

Neither company has said when the court will rule on the dispute or whether additional filings will disclose the contents of the alleged transfers.

Why does the July case matter?

Apple brought the trade secret case against OpenAI in July. That timing makes the current allegation part of an escalating sequence: litigation first, followed by competing factual narratives from the two sides.

The dispute lands in an industry where engineer mobility between rivals is routine and where allegations of data transfer have become a standard feature of talent wars. A claim of 100-plus files moved to a personal account, paired with a flat denial from the receiving employer, is the classic shape of such disputes.

For chief executives and general counsel watching the case, the takeaway is procedural rather than speculative. Two facts are now on the record: OpenAI says more than 100 files went to a personal account before an employee joined Apple, and Apple says its own review found no evidence supporting that claim. Everything else — the files' contents, the timing of any court findings, the potential remedies — remains ahead.

The case now turns on which of those two statements survives scrutiny.