Madiha Yaqoob
OpenAI revealed in a tweet on Tuesday night that it has obtained a “preliminary agreement” for Sam Altman, the former CEO, to be reinstated. Under the new setup, a first board will be formed, with existing board member and Quora CEO Adam D’Angelo, former Salesforce executive Bret Taylor, and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.
“I love OpenAI, and everything I’ve done over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together,” tweeted Altman, demonstrating his dedication to the project. The favorable development was also noted by Greg Brockman, who resigned as president after being removed from OpenAI’s board on Friday. He said, “Amazing progress made today.” We are going to return better and more cohesive than before. Subsequently, Brockman declared he would be “getting back to coding tonight” when he returned to the workplace.
As to the release, Helen Toner, Tasha McCauley, and Ilya Sutskever, the co-founder of OpenAI, will be leaving the transitional board. Among those who voted to remove Altman, D’Angelo is the only member who is still in office. With a tweet that said, “And now, we all get some sleep,” and a sleeping face emoji, Toner ended her period of public silence.
It was unclear what Sutskever’s position was at the corporation as of early Wednesday morning. Although CEO Satya Nadella does not plan to join the board, Microsoft, a significant investor that has committed over $10 billion to OpenAI, expressed support for the reforms and called them an “essential step” toward stable governance.
Since Altman’s dismissal on Friday, things have happened quickly, creating turmoil within the AI company. In protest, Brockman resigned, and Twitch’s former CEO Emmett Shear took over as interim leader. An open letter threatening resignation if the board did not step down was signed by over 95% of the company. After it was first revealed that Altman and Brockman would be joining Microsoft to form a new advanced research division, Altman persisted in talks with the OpenAI board.
Altman conveyed his excitement about rejoining OpenAI with the backing of Microsoft and the new board. Shear praised the settlement, saying it maximized safety and benefited all stakeholders. Shear held the position of interim CEO for just over 48 hours.
D’Angelo, who founded Quora and served as Facebook’s first CTO, was a crucial negotiator in Altman’s return. Former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor reportedly raised money for his AI business before stepping down in January. In a December interview, Harvard University president and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers lauded OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Prominent financiers, like Thrive Capital’s Josh Kushner and Sequoia Capital’s Alfred Lin, expressed their endorsement of the initiative and emphasized the founders’ dedication to the business’s goal. Following a busy few days in the tech community, Altman’s last name was added to OpenAI’s post on X.
