OpenAI co-founder and president Greg Brockman has left the company, the company announced Friday, as the Microsoft-backed giant abruptly fired CEO Sam Altman. This happened a few hours after I had promised to stay. Brockman’s sudden departure added to the uncertainty of the day at OpenAI, which was held on the heels of the first developer conference led by Altman.
“I’m so proud of what we’ve all built together since we started living in our apartment eight years ago. We’ve made it through difficult and wonderful times together, and for every reason that should have been impossible. Nevertheless, we have accomplished a lot,” Brockman wrote in a message to the OpenAI team. “However, based on today’s news, I have resigned. I wish you all the best. I continue to believe in our mission to create safe AGI that benefits all of humanity.”
OpenAI previously announced that Brockman will step down as chairman of the board but will remain with the company. Brockman, who co-founded OpenAI with Altman, is a confidant of the former OpenAI CEO.
OpenAI, Brockman, and Microsoft, which is not on the startup’s board of directors but owns about half of the company, are taking advantage of Altman’s large-scale language models, which have energized and intensified the AI race. He remains tight-lipped about the circumstances that led to his expulsion.
Their departure shocked Silicon Valley. Altman is the public face of the startup, which is widely presumed to be leading the current AI race, as well as having built on OpenAI’s services in less than a year. He has also held the position of kingmaker for countless start-up companies.
Early Friday, OpenAI announced that Altman had lost the trust of the board and left the company. OpenAI said Mr. Altman resigned from the company after a “deliberative process” by the board concluded that he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, which hindered his “ability to meet his responsibilities.” Then he announced.
The announcement comes less than two weeks after OpenAI held its first developer conference. There, Altman shared that ChatGPT gained him 100 million users. “We love you,” said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who was the guest of honor at the conference. In a subsequent interview with FT, Altman said he expected to raise “even more” funding from Microsoft and other investors in the future.
“We have a long-term agreement with OpenAI, giving us full access to everything we need to deliver on our innovation agenda and exciting product roadmap. Together, we will continue to deliver the meaningful benefits of this technology to the world,” Nadella said in a statement Friday.