ALBAWABA – Mutiny ensued among staff and employees soon after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was dismissed and Twitch’s former boss Emmett Shear was appointed in his stead, news agencies reported Tuesday.
Both Bloomberg and Reuters confirmed Monday that Altman will not be reappointed as OpenAI CEO, despite pressures from major company investors including Microsoft.
Instead, the company board of directors brought in Shear due to his alignment with their views on the risks and threats of AI, the news agencies explained.
Altman will join Microsoft as CEO of a research unit, along with a number of high-level executive colleagues and at least one co-founder, the reports confirmed.
Will ousted OpenAI Sam Altman return as CEO with the backing of major company investors?
Several other staff members have expressed their intentions to join Altman and his colleagues, threatening to quit if he is not reinstated as OpenAI CEO.
The company is engaged in “intense discussions”, according to Bloomberg, after Vice President of Global Affairs Anna Makanju delivered the message in an internal memo.
OpenAI management is in touch with Altman, Shear and the board “but they are not prepared to give us a final response this evening,” Makanju wrote.
In a letter released to the media, the vast majority of OpenAI's staff of 770 personnel suggested they would follow Altman unless the board responsible for his departure resigned, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
"Your actions have made it obvious that you are incapable of overseeing OpenAI," the letter said. "Microsoft has assured us that there are positions for all OpenAI employees at this new subsidiary should we choose to join."
A key AI executive at Microsoft confirmed to AFP that they all were in fact welcome to join if the board that removed Altman doesn't resign.
Among the signatories who ousted Altman was co-founder Ilya Sutskever, the company's chief scientist and a member of the four-person board who pushed Altman out.
