On Friday, OpenAI announced a “leadership transition” that would see Sam Altman depart the company and be immediately replaced by appointed interim CEO Mira Murati, previously chief.
Why it matters: Sam Altman, who co-founded well-known artificial intelligence firm OpenAI, was fired as CEO on Friday in a move that sent shockwaves through Silicon Valley. His sudden departure seems to have prompted other senior figures at the company to quit, which is a huge blow to companies like Microsoft which are deeply invested in using and building OpenAI tech as part of their wider strategy.
On Friday, OpenAI announced a “leadership transition” that would see Sam Altman depart the company and be immediately replaced by appointed interim CEO Mira Murati, previously chief technology officer. The company says the decision was made following a review process by the board of directors who no longer have confidence in Altman’s ability to lead OpenAI and stay “consistently candid in his communications with the board.”
Hours after the news broke about Altman’s abrupt exit, OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman revealed on X that he was leaving the company in light of this development. And if a report from The Information is to be believed, three senior researchers at the AI firm have also quit for the same reason.
One of them is said to be none other than Jakub Pachocki, the director of research at OpenAI who has been recently credited by Altman for his contribution to the development of GPT-4.
