The lawsuit between two tech giants may seem distant from Vietnamese Americans' daily lives, but it directly affects a specific group in the community: Vietnamese-origin engineers working in hardware and AI in Silicon Valley, especially those holding H-1B visas or waiting for green cards.
Non-disclosure agreements and exit procedures can now become grounds for litigation, no longer just harmless administrative formalities.
The mechanism: employment contracts become legal weapons
According to the lawsuit, Apple alleges that former Vice President of Product Design Tang Tan, who worked at Apple for 24 years, used an internal project codename when recruiting for OpenAI and asked candidates to bring Apple components to interviews. Another engineer, Chang Liu, is accused of not returning the company laptop after leaving Apple in early 2026 and using it to download confidential technical documents. This is not just internal company business — it is a warning for anyone considering switching from a major corporation to a rival company: non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) and exit procedures can now become grounds for civil litigation, carrying far more serious consequences than a typical civil lawsuit.
Who is affected and the extent
According to the lawsuit as cited by 9to5Mac, there are over 400 former Apple employees currently working for OpenAI — a number showing the flow of personnel between the two companies is far larger than the two names mentioned in the suit. For Vietnamese-origin engineers working on hardware, chips, or product design at major companies, the message is clear: any documents, project code, or even sample components taken when changing jobs could be viewed as evidence of trade secret theft. For those holding H-1B visas or waiting for green cards, the risk is even greater — a civil lawsuit involving alleged fraud or contract violations could indirectly affect sponsorship applications if the new employer gets dragged into prolonged legal disputes.
Precedent and what to watch
Apple said it sent a warning letter to OpenAI starting in February but received no response before filing the suit. Notably, this lawsuit comes just two months after a federal jury ruled in OpenAI's favor in Elon Musk's lawsuit against the company, showing U.S. courts do not automatically side with plaintiffs in major tech disputes. The partnership between Apple and OpenAI to bring ChatGPT into Siri has cooled since Apple switched to using Google's technology for its new Siri. A similar lawsuit — the New York Times suing OpenAI and Microsoft over the use of news content to train AI — was filed in 2023, showing this legal model is becoming increasingly common in the AI industry.
What Vietnamese-origin engineers should do
For those working in hardware, AI, or semiconductors, now is the time to carefully review non-disclosure agreements and exit procedures before accepting a new job offer. Retaining company files, emails, or devices after leaving — even unintentionally — could become evidence in a lawsuit in which you are not the primary party.