OpenAI CEO Sam Altman lands new job at Microsoft after surprise firing
The head of one of the world’s leading AI companies was fired for not being ‘candid’ with the board, then swiftly hired by one of the company’s major shareholders, Microsoft
By Matthew Sparkes
20 November 2023
Sam Altman was fired as CEO of OpenAI on 17 November
Abaca Press / Alamy
Sam Altman, the former CEO of OpenAI, is to start a new venture at Microsoft, just days after being fired by the company behind ChatGPT and DALL-E. Here is a quick summary of the big shake-up in Silicon Valley.
Why was Sam Altman fired?
On 17 November, OpenAI’s board of directors unexpectedly fired the company’s CEO Sam Altman. The board cryptically announced that Altman “was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities”. This led to a wave of rumours about the reason for the decision.
Within hours, Greg Brockman, the president of OpenAI, was removed from the board and later resigned from his position at the company. Three senior researchers – Jakub Pachocki, Aleksander Madry and Szymon Sidor – also quit.
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The board appointed chief technology officer Mira Murati as interim CEO and announced that a search process was under way to find a permanent successor. Murati’s tenure was brief: within two days, Emmett Shear, who co-founded video streaming service Twitch, was appointed as interim CEO.
Shear tweeted a message saying that the board didn’t remove Altman over any specific disagreement on AI safety, and promised that an independent investigation leading to a report would be carried out over the next month. He also promised to “reform the management and leadership team” and hinted that “governance changes” might be needed at the company.
Could Sam Altman return to OpenAI?
Within a day of Altman’s shock departure, there were reports that OpenAI investors, including technology giant Microsoft, were pressuring the board to bring him back. Talks seemed to go nowhere, however.
