A class-action lawsuit has been filed against Microsoft in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing the company of artificially inflating ChatGPT prices by restricting OpenAI's access to computing resources through its Azure cloud dominance.
The lawsuit, brought by eleven ChatGPT Plus subscribers, alleges that from November 2022 to February 2025, Microsoft exploited an exclusive 2019 cloud deal with OpenAI to overcharge users and degrade service quality. Plaintiffs claim this led to ChatGPT Plus subscriptions being priced up to 200 times higher than competitors' rates in the Consumer Generative AI Market, which includes products like Claude Pro and Gemini Advanced.
In June 2025, OpenAI ended the exclusivity and began purchasing compute from Google Cloud, resulting in an 80% drop in ChatGPT token prices within weeks. This shift is cited as evidence of Microsoft's anticompetitive conduct, which allegedly stifled innovation and caused slow response times for users.
Microsoft holds a 49% stake in OpenAI's for-profit arm and takes 20% of paid-product revenue, profiting from both compute sales and constrained AI products. The lawsuit seeks monetary damages and a permanent injunction to prevent future exclusive agreements, with legal experts highlighting the 2019 deal as potential key evidence.
