Employees at OpenAI have threatened to resign in droves after former CEO Sam Altman joined Microsoft.
Hundreds of employees signed a
letter demanding that Altman and previous President Greg Brockman be restored
or face mass resignations.
The future of OpenAI looked to be
in jeopardy Monday, with hundreds of business employees signing a letter urging
the board to resign after the board was unable to find an agreement to
reinstate expelled CEO Sam Altman.
Altman, who left OpenAI on
Friday, joined Microsoft on Monday, following a weekend of boardroom upheaval
that sent shockwaves across Silicon Valley. Altman will manage a new artificial
intelligence project at Microsoft, the tech behemoth said early Monday,
following speculation that he might make a dramatic return to the business he
helped create into one of the world's hottest companies.
Hours later, according to a letter obtained by Wired and journalist Kara Swisher and later shared with NBC News, OpenAI employees would resign and possibly join Microsoft "unless all current board members resign, and the board appoints two new lead independent directors, such as Bret Taylor and Will Hurd, and reinstates Sam Altman and Greg Brockman."
According to an OpenAI spokesman,
the letter was shared to the board.
"Your actions have made it obvious that you are incapable of overseeing OpenAI," the text of the letter states. "We are unable to work for or with individuals who lack competence, judgment, and concern for our mission and employees." We, the undersigned, may decide to leave OpenAI and join the recently announced Microsoft subsidiary led by Sam Altman and Greg Brockman."
More than 700 names were on the
letter as of late Monday morning, however NBC News has not confirmed that
everyone opted to sign it. Many of them had made the same message on X, saying,
"OpenAI is nothing without its people."
According to the spokeswoman,
OpenAI employs around 770 people.
Ilya Sutskever, a board member
and co-founder of OpenAI whose name appeared on the letter, told X that he was
sorry for his participation in Altman's departure.
He seemed to infer that there were continuous efforts to resurrect Altman.
"I love everything we've
built together and I will do everything I can to reunite the company," he
stated in an email.
Altman cited the post and added
three hearts to it.
Emmett Shear, co-founder and
former CEO of video streaming site Twitch, acknowledged his appointment as
OpenAI's temporary CEO.
OpenAI, created in 2015 with
funding from numerous internet billionaires, has emerged as the leader of a new
generation of AI technology best recognized by the chatbot software ChatGPT in
recent years. That app exploded in popularity nearly precisely a year ago,
showcasing the enormous leaps AI has made and propelling OpenAI to the top of
the digital startup world.
Just before 3 a.m. ET, Microsoft
Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella announced the Altman appointment on X, more than
48 hours after OpenAI's board of directors stated it "no longer had
confidence" in Altman - a key player in the tech industry's attempts to
wrestle with the promise and possible risks of AI.
Microsoft is a significant financial sponsor of OpenAI, having committed billions since the company's initial investment round in 2019. Since then, OpenAI has emerged as the most visible of a new generation of AI businesses, with its ChatGPT, a huge language model chatbot, becoming a symbol of daily AI advancement.
Nadella reiterated Microsoft's
commitment to helping OpenAI, which now has a new leadership team, while also
revealing that Altman will lead a "new advanced AI research team"
with Brockman, an OpenAI co-founder who was kicked off the company's board and
then resigned as president on Friday.
"We look forward to moving
quickly to provide them with the resources needed for their success,"
Nadella said in a statement.
Altman reshared the post with the
caption, "The mission continues."
After a study, OpenAI claimed he
was "not consistently candid in his communications with the board,
hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities."
Brockman wrote on X on Friday that he and Altman were "shocked and saddened" by the board's decision, but that "greater things are coming soon."
According to CNBC, several OpenAI
investors are lobbying for Altman's reinstatement after Chief Technology
Officer Mira Murati was designated temporary CEO.
Shear, on the other hand,
revealed on X early Monday that he will instead run OpenAI.
He outlined his strategy for the
first 30 days, which included hiring an independent investigator "to dig
into the entire process leading up to this point and generate a full
report."
Shear went on to say that
"OpenAI's stability and success are too important to allow turmoil to
disrupt them like this," and added that "I have nothing but respect
for what Sam and the entire OpenAI team have built."
