OpenAI board fires director Sam Altman, who founded the company

The board of OpenAI, the company that developed ChatGPT, among other things, has fired co-founder and current director Sam Altman.

According to the board, Altman “was not consistently forthcoming in his communications with the board, which hindered the board’s ability to discharge responsibilities.” The board does not mention any examples and Altman himself is also vague about his departure. He says on X that he loved his time at OpenAI and announces that he will soon hear more about his future plans.

The directorship of OpenAI is temporarily taken over by Mira Murati. She was already the director for technical affairs within the company.

Altman founded OpenAI in 2015 with Tesla founder Elon Musk and Amazon Web Services, part of Amazon, among others. Under his leadership, ChatGPT was launched last year. It led to a huge growth in interest in artificial intelligence.

The Verge calls Altman’s departure very surprising. Altman was the face of the company. Last week he spoke extensively at OpenAI’s first major developer event.

In addition to Altman’s resignation, OpenAI also announced that another co-founder, Greg Brockman, is stepping down as chairman of the board. He will remain active within the company.