OpenAI rocked by executive exits in the midst of fundraising effort

OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati and two other executives announced their departures Wednesday, adding to an exodus of senior leaders as the ChatGPT maker seeks billions of dollars in new funding to keep pace with its Big Tech rivals in the AI arms race.

Murati, who joined the company in 2018, had become OpenAI’s most prominent executive besides CEO Sam Altman, representing the company at product announcements and in media interviews. “I’m stepping away because I want to create the time and space to do my own exploration,” she wrote in a message sent to OpenAI employees and posted on X.

Later in the day, Altman said in a message posted to X that Chief Research Officer Bob McGrew and a vice president of research, Barret Zoph, were also leaving the company, stating that they all made their decisions to leave independently.

“Leadership changes are a natural part of companies, especially companies that grow so quickly and are so demanding,” Altman said, going on to acknowledge that Murati’s was a surprise departure he learned of only Wednesday morning. “I obviously won’t pretend it’s natural for this one to be so abrupt, but we are not a normal company,” he said, adding that Murati told him that she announced the news suddenly because it would have leaked otherwise.

Murati’s last day at OpenAI has not been fixed and she is still discussing the details of her departure from the company with its leadership, a person close to her said on the condition of anonymity to discuss private information. A spokesman for OpenAI declined to comment beyond Altman’s statements.

Murati’s departure leaves OpenAI without one of its longest-serving and best-known executives. It comes after OpenAI co-founder and Chief Scientist Ilya Sutskever left the company in May and started his own AI firm. Another co-founder and key executive, Greg Brockman, is on a leave of absence. Co-founder and research scientist John Shulman, and head of product Peter Deng both also left in recent months.

Several OpenAI researchers who worked on making sure the company’s tech is “aligned” with human values quit over the past year, alleging the company hadn’t taken its own commitments to AI safety seriously enough.

The turnover of personnel comes at a crucial time for OpenAI. The company is in the midst of securing more than $100 billion in new investment funding, according to a person familiar with the fundraising discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share details about private negotiations. At the same time, the company is planning to restructure itself from being controlled by a nonprofit board bound to a charter that states OpenAI will ensure advanced AI benefits all of humanity, into a for-profit benefit corporation, Reuters reported Wednesday.

That nonprofit structure has long raised questions about how OpenAI might grow and reward its investors. Generally, venture capital firms invest in companies in return for equity that might grow in value if the company is successful and can be easily sold to realize a return on the initial investment.

OpenAI’s launch of ChatGPT in 2022 set off a frenzy of new investment in AI across the tech industry and helped the company raise billions of dollars from Microsoft, which in return got access to OpenAI’s technology. But some investors have begun to warn that the high costs of AI development, including spending on powerful computer chips, will be difficult to recoup.

Altman’s vision for the future of AI demands huge amounts of investments from both private companies and governments. In September, he visited the White House and presented a company analysis arguing that building several data centers across the United States at a cost of $100 billion each would lead to job and GDP growth.

The analysis compared the United States to China and said massive investment in AI was necessary to maintain America’s technological lead.

Murati joined OpenAI in 2018, rising to become its chief technology officer in 2022. She was named interim CEO after OpenAI’s nonprofit board ousted Altman in November but in the firestorm that followed his departure supported his return as chief executive.

Murati was one of the hundreds of OpenAI employees who signed a letter threatening to quit if Altman was not reinstated as CEO. The letter had also been signed by Sutskever, even though he had previously voted in favor of ousting Altman.

Altman was restored as CEO in a deal that saw three of the four board members who had voted to fire him step down. He regained his seat on the board after a law firm’s investigation concluded that there was no evidence of wrongdoing before his brief departure from the company. The Washington Post previously reported that allegations from senior leaders that Altman had been psychologically abusive played a role in the board’s decision to fire him as CEO.

Among OpenAI employees, Murati is widely known for her hands-on role and close involvement with development of the company’s core products. Over the last year, her profile as a spokesperson for the company continued to grow, serving as a key executive giving interviews to the media and appearing in the company’s public demonstrations of its new products.

In July, The Post reported that some members of OpenAI’s safety team felt the company had rushed through safety tests of the new AI model introduced on stage by Murati and VP of research Zoph at a May event. OpenAI said the launch had been “stressful” but didn’t cut corners. A group of senators subsequently asked the company to release more information about its safety work.

The same month, OpenAI whistleblowers filed a complaint with the SEC alleging that the company had illegally prohibited employees from warning regulators about the risks of its technology. The company said it respects the right of its staff to make protected disclosures.

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Cat Zakrzewski contributed to this report.