Just a few days after being abruptly ousted from OpenAI, Sam Altman is joining the Microsoft team along with Greg Brockman.
On Nov. 20, Satya Nadella, Chairman and CEO of Microsoft Corporation, announced on X that “Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, together with colleagues, will be joining Microsoft to lead a new advanced AI research team.”
The X community warmly welcomed the announcement. It praised Microsoft’s CEO for quick reaction to the scandalous events at OpenAI that could have negatively affected the corporate shares.
On Friday, Nov. 17, the board of directors of OpenAI, the creator of the popular generative AI chatbot ChatGPT, supported by Microsoft’s generous investments, fired its CEO Sam Altman. Greg Brockman, the company’s director and co-founder, also quit after learning about Mr Altman’s departure and other leadership changes.
Shortly after the leadership change became public, the company’s investors tried to find ways to bring Mr Altman back to OpenAI. Nevertheless, the board that fired him reportedly refused to agree to the proposed terms of his reinstatement.
Initially, it was announced that the post of interim CEO of OpenAI would be assigned to Mira Murati, the company’s chief technology officer. However, over the weekend, WSJ reported that Emmett Shear, former chief executive of Twitch, was named interim CEO.
The same is confirmed by Mr Nadella’s post. He states Microsoft is looking forward “to getting to know Emmett Shear and OAI’s new leadership team and working with them.”
Meanwhile, Sam Altman and Greg Brockman will lead a new advanced AI research team at Microsoft. Lately, the company accelerated its efforts in AI development. Microsoft is reportedly developing low-cost AI software that could compete in quality with machine intelligence created by OpenAI specialists. Moreover, the company has recently unveiled its first homegrown artificial intelligence chip and processor for cloud computing.
