The company responsible for ChatGPT, OpenAI, announced this Wednesday that it has reached an agreement according to which Sam Altman will return as CEO a few days after his dismissal, ending a protracted conflict over the future of the startup in the midst of an artificial intelligence boom. In addition to Altman’s return, the company has agreed to partially reshuffle the board that ousted him. Sam Altman quickly explained his position in a post on X: “I look forward to returning to OpenAI.”. This Monday, the OpenAI board decided to appoint Emmett Shear, co-founder and former CEO of Twitch, as the company’s new interim CEO, after initially replacing Altman with Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati on Friday.
Hours later, Altman announced that he would be joining Microsoft following his firing. An action that much of the company rejected. In fact, the vast majority of OpenAI employees signed a letter this Tuesday afternoon in which the employees threatened to resign and join Microsoft if the board did not relent and reverse its decision to fire Altman, even though the board had previously decided to stick with his position. According to sources familiar with the situation quoted by the Financial Times, a total of 747 of OpenAI’s 770 employees had signed the letter to convince management to resign and replace Altman before his departure to Microsoft, the company’s main shareholder company to rehire.
Likewise among the investors who support the generative artificial intelligence company Support for the needs of OpenAI employees also increased According to several sources, they would consider legal measures to force the board to change course. Last Friday, OpenAI announced the “exit” of Sam Altman as CEO and member of the board, citing a loss of trust from the board and stating that Altman “has not been consistently honest in his communications with this board,” which “affected his ability to carry out his duties.
“Mr. Altman’s departure follows an advisory review process by the Board, which concluded that he was not consistently open in his communications with the Board impaired his ability to carry out his duties. “The board no longer has confidence in its ability to continue to lead OpenAI,” the statement said. For his part, Microsoft President and CEO Satya Nadella also announced on Tuesday the inclusion of Sam Altman, as well as Greg Brockman and other OpenAI employees, as part of a new advanced AI research team.
In this sense, in an interview with the CNBC network, the top Microsoft executive expressed his support for Sam Altman, regardless of whether the entrepreneur returned to the management of OpenAI or continued to develop his work at the Redmond giant. “Of course, regardless of the configuration We want Sam and Greg to have a great home if they will not be there with OpenAI and all their colleagues at Microsoft,” said Nadella, adding that it is the directors and employees of the creator of ChatGPT who will have to decide. “The only thing that matters to me is to ensure that.” “We can continue to innovate,” emphasized the CEO of Microsoft, emphasizing that the multinational corporation “has all the capacity to do this ourselves.”