The company behind ChatGPT and GPT-4 has ousted its CEO and co-founder Sam Altman. According to a blog post from OpenAI: “Mr. Altman’s departure follows a thoughtful review process by the Board, which concluded that he was not consistently forthright in his communications with the Board, thereby hindering its ability to carry out its responsibilities. The Board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue to lead OpenAI.”
Despite being intentionally vague, these seem like some serious allegations. The timing of the blog post on Friday afternoon makes the announcement even more surprising. There is a lot of speculation about the reason behind his sudden departure, but nothing clear has come to the surface yet.
Altman has since posted on Loved working with talented people. More to say later about what’s next.”
The response doesn’t address any of the comments made in the blog post, but does hint that Altman already has something new in the works.
This sudden announcement comes just a day after speaking at the APEC AI Forum and a week after Altman was on stage in his first developer conference appearance announcing several new ChatGPT features, including GPT-4 Turbo and Custom GPT.
In place of Altman, CTO (Chief Technology Officer) Mira Muratti will serve as interim CEO, although OpenAI says a search is currently underway to find a permanent replacement. Muratti previously worked at Tesla and has been at OpenAI since 2018.
This news is significant because Altman was not just a CEO, but a very visible face for the future of OpenAI and AI as a whole.
Shortly after the announcement, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt posted on X in support of Altman, saying, “I can’t wait to see what he does next.”
This is breaking news, and we will update the story as more details emerge.