Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, plans to rejoin the company’s board of directors, The Information reported Friday, just four months after his sudden firing—and rehiring—as the company looks to move on from internal turmoil that rocked the tech industry late last year.
Sam Altman will reportedly return to the board of OpenAI, even after that same board ousted him for allegedly failing to be “candid” with it.
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Key Takeaways
- Altman, the 38-year-old CEO of ChatGPT maker OpenAI, will return to the board after agreeing to an investigation into the course of events leading up to his removal from the company last November, an unnamed source told The Information.
- Altman was ousted in a shocking move last November following a critical internal report that found the CEO was not always candid with the company in his communications with the board, a move that outraged company employees, sparking a major push to resign—and Altman’s eventual return.
- The date of Altman’s return to the board was not made public—Forbes has reached out to OpenAI for confirmation.
- OpenAI’s nonprofit board serves as the company’s governing body for all activities.
Tangent
Altman will return to the board as the company faces heat from billionaire Elon Musk. The X owner and world’s second-richest person sued Altman and the company he co-founded last week, claiming the company failed on its founding goal of developing a generative AI model to “benefit humanity,” claiming the company instead put a focus on maximizing profits. Specifically, Musk argued company executives reneged on that goal by restricting access for users.
Key Background
Altman was pushed out of the blossoming AI company in November following a scathing internal review that revealed the CEO was not “consistently candid” in his reports to the board, a shocking dismissal in the AI arena Altman helped grow.
According to that internal review, Altman’s actions were responsible for “hindering [the board’s] ability to exercise its responsibilities,” with the board lacking “confidence in his ability to continue leading” the company.
Altman’s ouster sent shockwaves through the tech industry and within OpenAI, where 95% of the company’s roughly 750 employees threatened to resign unless the tech giant reinstated Altman. It took less than a week for OpenAI to reach a tentative agreement with Altman, a deal in which the company would not only reinstate Altman as CEO, but form a new board of directors chaired by ex-Salesforce CEO Bret Taylor.
This article was first published on forbes.com.
