Last week’s shock dismissal of Sam Altman as CEO of OpenAI has caused a lot of controversy for the company and could lead to a dramatic collapse of a hugely influential company. Altman has been a well respected talisman for OpenAI in their dramatic rise over the last year, becoming not just the face of OpenAI, but one of the most influential faces in AI.
Altman was let go by the OpenAI following what the company described as a “deliberative review process by the board, which concluded that he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities.” As a result of this, “the board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI.” During this process, the OpenAI board voted for the removed OpenAI president and chairman of the board, Greg Brockman, as chairman of the board. Shortly after the dismissal of Altman, Brockman resigned from his position as president.
Altman has since signed on at Microsoft, OpenAI’s largest backer, to head up a new AI initiative within Microsoft. This is a big win for Microsoft, who have utilized OpenAI’s technology to build out its own suite of products, including their AI-powered search engine, now known as Copilot.
The importance of Alman, and potentially Brockman, to the culture and morale of OpenAI cannot be understated as hundreds of staff have signed a petition stating that they will all leave OpenAI and follow Altman to Microsoft if the OpenAI board is not replaced immediately.
In a press release, senior OpenAI staff stated that the “process through which you terminated Sam Altman and removed [co-founder and former president] Greg Brockman from the board has jeopardized all of this work and undermined our mission and company,” Continuing: “Your conduct has made it clear you did not have the competence to oversee OpenAI”. And most alarmingly for OpenAI: “Microsoft has assured us that there are positions for all OpenAI employees at this new subsidiary should we choose to join.”
Meanwhile, OpenAI has begun investigation on building ChatGPT 5, however the investment required will be huge and needs the backing of Microsoft to be able to start work on the fifth iteration of their chat functionality. Without Altman, this becomes a much harder proposition for OpenAI to get the investment they will likely need to begin work. Also, Microsoft might be unwilling to give as much investment to OpenAI, if they are able to begin work on their own variation of GPT, powered by the same people responsible but as Microsoft employees.
This all could have a detrimental impact on OpenAI. While ChatGPT has maintained its position as the market leader in this space, a fact further emphasized by their successful developer’s session a few weeks ago, the outlook does not look good. Without the leadership team who have driven OpenAI from strength to strength, they run the risk of falling beyond quickly as competitors circle.
OpenAI’s biggest threat is from its closest ally, as Microsoft could be in position to create an all-conquering AI solution without the need to OpenAI much longer. While competitors like Google and Anthropic may not be able to close the technology gap quickly, 2024 looks to be a tipping point in which competitors may have a window to catch up and potentially surpass OpenAI, as OpenAI stagnates.
[UPDATE]
Sam Altman and Greg Brockman have been reinstated back to their positions within OpenAI. The move also saw the removal of all but one person from the board that ousted Altman just 5 days earlier.
The result ends a tumultuous period for OpenAI, and one that threatened to bring about the end of OpenAI. Rumors and speculation are starting to surface on the root cause of the initial move to remove Altman, and if true are incredibly damning of one person in particular on the board.
OpenAI also announced the new members of the board, bringing in a lot of leadership from key areas. This includes Bret Taylor, CEO of Salesforce, Larry Summers, former US Secretary of the Treasury, and Adam D’Angelo, CEO of Quora.
This will help bring closure to the staff of OpenAI who threatened to leave, but only time will tell if this will bring stability, or if it is the first crack in a bigger issue.