Days after his dismissal by the board, OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman has been reinstated as CEO, as announced by the organization on Tuesday.
The official statement on X, formerly Twitter, revealed the agreement reached in principle, appointing Altman as CEO with a revamped initial board featuring Bret Taylor as Chair, Larry Summers, and Adam D’Angelo.
Despite being fired by OpenAI’s board last week, Altman disclosed that he garnered the backing of Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s CEO, for his return to the helm of OpenAI.
Expressing his enthusiasm, Altman wrote on X, “With the new board and Satya’s support, I’m looking forward to returning to OpenAI and building on our strong partnership with Microsoft.”
The situation intensified when hundreds of OpenAI staff threatened to resign in response to Altman’s removal.
In a public letter, a significant majority of the company’s 770 employees implied their willingness to follow Altman unless the board that instigated his departure stepped down.
Among those who signed the letter was co-founder Ilya Sutskever, who admitted regret for his involvement in the board’s actions. Sutskever’s post on X on Monday expressed remorse: “I deeply regret my participation in the board’s actions. I never intended to harm OpenAI.”
Despite external pressures from Microsoft and other major investors, OpenAI initially appointed Emmett Shear, the former chief executive of Amazon’s streaming platform Twitch, as the new CEO, before Altman’s reinstatement.
