OpenAI’s board of directors announced late Friday that Sam Altman will step down as CEO and be replaced on an interim basis by CTO Mira Muratti.
The company said it conducted an “advisory review process” and “concluded that he has not been consistently forthright in his communications with the board, impeding his ability to exercise his responsibilities.”
“The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue to lead OpenAI,” the statement said.
OpenAI’s board includes chief scientist Ilya Sutskever and independent directors such as Quora CEO Adam D’Angelo, tech entrepreneur Tasha McCauley and Helen Toner of the Georgetown Center for Security and Emerging Technologies. OpenAI reports that the board is its “overall governing body for all OpenAI activities”.
The board also announced that Greg Brockman, president of OpenAI, “will step down as chairman of the board and will remain in his role with the company, reporting to the CEO.”
Sam Altman acknowledged he was leaving OpenAI in a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Friday, but did not mention any accusations from the firm’s board that he had not been forthcoming during unspecified reviews. He says he likes working at the company and will talk more about “what’s next later.”
i loved my time at openai. it was transformative for me personally, and hopefully the world a little bit. most of all i loved working with such talented people.
will have more to say about what’s next later.
????
— Sam Altman (@sama) November 17, 2023
Regarding Muratti’s appointment, OpenAI reported: “As head of the company’s research, product and safety functions, Meera is uniquely qualified to step into the role of interim CEO. We have great confidence in her ability to lead OpenAI through this transition period.”
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OpenAI, which received billions of dollars from Microsoft and ranked first on CNBC’s Disruptor 50 list this year, rose to prominence in late 2022 after publicly releasing its AI chatbot ChatGPT. The service became wildly popular as it allowed users to convert simple text into creative conversation, and prompted major tech companies like Alphabet and Meta to increase their investments in artificial intelligence.
Microsoft shares fell after the announcement, closing the day down 1.7% at $369.84.
A Microsoft spokesperson wrote in a statement that the company has “a long-term partnership with OpenAI, and Microsoft remains committed to Mira Murati and her team as we deliver this next era of artificial intelligence to our customers.”
In a post on X, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella commented on his company’s “long-term agreement” with OpenAI, explaining that it “will remain committed to our partnership and to Mira and the team.” Nadella did not mention Altman’s departure.
As you saw at Microsoft Ignite this week, we’re continuing to rapidly innovate for this era of AI, with over 100 announcements across the full tech stack – from AI systems, models, and tools in Azure, to Copilot. Most importantly, we’re committed to delivering all of this to our…
— Satya Nadella (@satyanadella) November 17, 2023
Brockman also shared a post on X that included the message he sent to his former colleagues at OpenAI, informing them that he had “resigned” after learning of “today’s news.”
After learning today’s news, this is the message I sent to the OpenAI team: https://t.co/NMnG16yFmm pic.twitter.com/8x39P0ejOM
— Greg Brockman (@gdb) November 18, 2023
OpenAI was launched as a non-profit organization in 2015 with the support of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who according to various sources has committed $1 billion to the project. Before taking over as CEO, Altman, 38, was president of startup accelerator Y Combinator and gained notoriety in Silicon Valley as an early-stage investor. Earlier in his career, he started the social networking company Loopt.
As OpenAI rose in popularity this year along with ChatGPT, so did Altman’s profile. He has become an ambassador of sorts, representing the growing artificial intelligence industry around the world.
In September, Indonesia awarded Altman a so-called “Golden Visa,” granting him 10 years of residency and privileges designed to help the country win more foreign investors.
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Altman visited several countries in the Asia-Pacific region over the summer, including Singapore, India, China, South Korea and Japan, meeting with government leaders and officials and giving public speeches about the rise of artificial intelligence and the need for regulation.
Source: GettyImages
Sam Altman
The engineer testified before the US Senate in May, urging lawmakers to regulate artificial intelligence, citing the technology’s potential to negatively impact the labor market, the information ecosystem and other societal and economic issues.
“I think if this technology goes wrong, it can go pretty wrong,” Altman said at the time. “And we want to be vocal about it. We want to work with the government to prevent that from happening.
In a prelude to his Senate testimony, Altman also spoke at a dinner with about 60 senators and congressmen, who were reportedly enthralled by his speech.
Most recently, Altman spoke this week at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference in San Francisco alongside various tech executives and world leaders, including US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
OpenAI held its first developer conference in early November, highlighting the startup’s growing popularity in the tech industry. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella made a surprise guest appearance at the event, joining Altman on stage to discuss the startup’s AI technology and its partnership with Microsoft.
2023-11-18 01:22:26
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