Sam Altman, who was fired as the CEO of ChatGPT creator OpenAI, will join Microsoft to lead a new team focused on artificial intelligence, the tech giant has announced.
Microsoft CEO and Chairman Satya Nadella said on Monday that Altman, fellow OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman and other former OpenAI employees will oversee a “new advanced AI research team” at the company.
“We look forward to moving quickly to provide them with the resources needed for their success,” Nadella said on X, formerly Twitter.
Nadella said Microsoft looked forward to working with OpenAI’s new leadership team, including interim CEO Emmett Shear, and remained committed to its partnership with the AI startup, in which it has reportedly invested $13bn.
The announcement comes after tech news site The Information reported on Sunday that Altman would not return to OpenAI despite executives’ efforts to bring him back.
Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI co-founder and board director, told staff on Sunday night that Altman would not be coming back after a weekend of negotiations with the board of directors, company leaders and investors, The Information said.
Altman, who became the public face of AI with the releases of ChatGPT and GPT-4, was abruptly fired on Friday after the company’s board determined he was “not consistently candid in his communications”.
