The CEO of a public corporation cannot simply take intellectual property from that corporation. That is called theft. Elon would be spending a lot of time in prison.
This will never, ever happen. Let’s stop considering it as a possibility.
The very fact that some shareholders are actively trying to keep Elon from receiving what is owed to him is example enough of how voting shareholders should not be trusted with deciding the future of AI.
However, if the board were to decide to change some aspects of the current arrangement because they felt it important for Tesla to keep AI safe, that would be entirely possible without it being theft.
Heck, I'd love to see it set up where the R&D is contracted to a benevolent private caretaker and the application of the AI is reserved for use by Tesla as part of the agreement.
Tesla funds the private organization for their research and development by paying them to create the applications. Maybe the private firm shares time on Tesla owned servers.
Nothing changes with development of the AI aspect of FSD, Optimus, and other Tesla AI applications. Tesla keeps 100% control of the hardware design, production, and sale/subscription for the products. The private company holds the rights to the AI development, contracted to Tesla.
Such an arrangement solves for Elon's concern of bad actors gaining enough voting shares to control the AI development in a detrimental manner. Which is possible as it is set up now. This is scary important stuff. Look at what happened to OpenAI now being "ClosedAI" thanks to Microsoft getting their fingers in that pie. This, and worse, is what Elon wants to prevent. AI is in its infancy and needs to be provided a well-rounded view of the world.
Money-grubbers might not spend time teaching AI about morals, ethics, and philosophy. That might not be good for mankind.
There have been plenty of people who think that just because the AI brain trust and the rights to the AI development move into private hands that this will automatically have a negative affect on Tesla. This is not necessarily the only way to do it. If the transfer is designed to be mutually beneficial for Tesla and the private party, and protects the ethical development of the AI, everybody wins.
If push comes to shove, I think I'll trust the Tesla BoD to figure out a clever way to accomplish this, and do it in a way that includes future financial benefit for Tesla in the process.
There's more than one way to skin this artificial cat.
Interested parties should take time to think about the myriad ways this could be accomplished, instead of knee-jerking like someone wants to take their birthday away. There are endless possibilities on how this can be accomplished, it is just a matter of choosing which way they want to do it.