OpenAI staff threaten to quit over Microsoft offer
Published: Mon 20 Nov 2023, 11:17 PM

Hundreds of staff at OpenAI are considering leaving the company to join Microsoft after OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman announced he was starting an AI subsidiary at Microsoft following his recent dismissal from OpenAI.

A letter was released by some of OpenAI’s most senior staff members threatening to leave the company if the board did not get replaced.

The list of signers included Ilya Sutskever, the company’s chief scientist, and Mira Murati, a top executive who was appointed to replace Altman but was herself demoted over the weekend.

Reports said as many as 500 of OpenAI’s 770 employees signed the letter.

OpenAI has appointed Emmett Shear, a former chief executive of Amazon’s streaming platform Twitch, as its new CEO despite pressure from Microsoft and other major investors to reinstate Altman.

However, OpenAI has stood by its decision, saying “Sam’s behavior and lack of transparency… undermined the board’s ability to effectively supervise the company.”

There has been fierce competition between OpenAI, Google, Meta, and other startups to develop AI models, particularly generative AI platforms like ChatGPT, which can be trained to answer complex questions in human-like language and generate and manipulate imagery.

Microsoft has invested more than $10 billion in OpenAI and looks forward to getting to know Emmett Shear and OpenAI’s new leadership team. They remain committed to their partnership with OpenAI and have confidence in the product roadmap.