Sam Altman: OpenAI to CloseAI

When the world woke up over the weekend, the summary dismissal of Sam Altman from the company he had co-founded by its Board over a perceived “loss of confidence” hit us hard. Many wondered what would happen to the ChatGPT journey, especially since Microsoft had invested heavily in the idea. Now, there are rumblings of a possible return, engineered by those with the most to lose by his exit. And Microsoft possibly heads that list. 

Breaking Now: Looks like it’s the end of the road for Sam Altman at OpenAI. The company announced that Twitch CEO Emmett Shear would be the interim CEO. Yes! You read that right. Shear will be the third CEO in as many days, taking over from Mira Murati, possibly because she’s aligned with Altman.

Over the weekend, reports started trickling in of investors and employees pushing for Altman’s reinstatement with news site The Information suggesting that Altman and co-founder Greg Brockman (who had resigned on Friday as President of OpenAI) had been invited to the company’s San Francisco headquarters on Sunday. 

In fact, Altman took to his X (formerly Twitter) handle to post a picture of himself with a guest pass to the building below which he wrote, “First and last time I ever wear one of these.” Of course, one can interpret this message both as a sign of rapprochement or a final adieu with the company he built that launched the popular ChatGPT bot. 

What transpired over this tumultuous weekend?

On Friday, the company’s board accused Altman of not being “consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities.” Of course, there were no specific instances of his lack of candidness. However, the global reaction to his ouster stems from fears that he might just set up a rival company to take on OpenAI. 

There were also reports that his sacking had angered the current and former employees who felt it could affect the upcoming $86 billion share sale with venture capital backers and tech giant Microsoft (which pumped in $10 billion seeking his return. In fact, Microsoft’s Seattle HQ was buzzing like a beehive as they had integrated OpenAItech into Windows applications. 

An exclusive report in The Information published late on Saturday said both Brockman and Altman might launch a new AI venture. Of course, there was no information around the exact nature of the project though there was talk of how Altman was discussing with semiconductor industry executives, which indicate a possible collaboration to create microchips that can lower the costs of large-language model-led companies such as OpenAI. 

How much of this is real and what’s not?

That such an effort could take years suggests that it might just be a conversation that Altman wants to have irrespective of whether the OpenAI Board invites him back or not. Speaking of which, some other reports suggested that his return could well depend on the board itself being revamped. Microsoft has already indicated that it wants a representative in that room. 

On Saturday evening, a day after the firing of Altman, several people that included OpenAI staff, were seen leaving his mansion located in San Francisco. They were there to learn about the company’s future and that of Altman as well, with some even petitioning early investors such as Tiger Global and Sequoia Capital to push for Altman’s reinstatement or the board’s removal. 

While we will soon get to know the future of Altman at OpenAI, the question is what led to his abrupt removal? In fact, the six member board included both Altman and Brockman who appear to have been blindsided completely by the remaining four directors. What could have made this small group act so quickly and decisively?

Conspiracy theories and the inevitable Elon Musk

Conspiracy theories already abound over Altman’s repeated commentary around the risks posed by the technology he was pioneering. His “AI is a tool not a creature” statement had brought out both his fears and hope. In fact, two weeks back he was in the UK at the world’s first AI Safety Summit talking about safeguards and guardrails for AI development. 

Given his commentaries around this topic, it appears quite clear that Altman had no idea of what was coming his way. Tech czars such as Satya Nadella have gone on record saying he had confidence in the company (not that he has a choice here) though Elon Musk has been strangely silent, which is surprising as he was part of the team that set up OpenAI. 

Their differences were rumored to be around shifting OpenAI from being a not-for-profit and one can see that Musk has already initiated a new chatbot called Grok on X (formerly Twitter). Is there a conflict of interest here? And while all this drama is being enacted, spare a thought for Open AI CTO Mira Murati, who’s the interim CEO of OpenAI and has a history of working with Musk’s car company Tesla in the past. 

A user on X called Varun Mathur (formerly Twitter had a caustic response to this entire story that questioned Murati’s ability to raise funds and concluded by telling her that eventually she would end up working for Microsoft that will take over OpenAI and spend the rest of her life as their Global Principal Product Managers. 

Ouch! That may hurt. But, the reality is that for OpenAI to move forward, you need someone to raise money and Altman has been good at selling narratives. Will the board want his chief storyteller back and what would be the terms is what we’re all waiting to learn now. Meanwhile, just ask ChatGPT who Sam Altman is, in case you want to forget his recent history.