This didn’t take long.
Shortly after OpenAI fired CEO Sam AltmanMicrosoft hired him, along with OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman, to lead the company’s new “advanced research team.”
Microsoft is an investor and partner in OpenAI and owns a very big bet in the company; Microsoft also uses OpenAI technology in its search engine, Bing.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who shared the news on Monday, wrote in X that the company remains “committed to our partnership with OpenAI.”
The tweet may have been deleted.
“(We are) confident in our product roadmap, in our ability to continue innovating with everything we announced at Microsoft Ignite, and in continuing to support our customers and partners. We look forward to meeting Emmett Shear and the new OAI leadership team and working with them.”
As for new Microsoft employees, Nadella wrote: “We look forward to acting quickly to provide them with the resources necessary for their success.” And in a reply to Altman Recognition Of his new role, he wrote that he is “very excited to have you join as CEO of this new group, Sam, which sets a new pace for innovation.”
OpenAI unexpectedly fired Altman last week, and the board first attempted to replace him with the company’s CTO, Mira Murati, before deciding on Emmett Shear, former Twitch executive, as interim CEO. Greg Brockman, co-founder and president of OpenAI, also resigned as chairman of OpenAI’s board of directors.
All of these changes, many of them seemingly sudden and unexpected even to experts, will undoubtedly deeply affect both OpenAI and Microsoft, as well as the relationship between the two companies. Given the amount of news we’ve heard from OpenAI, Microsoft, and Altman over the past three days, we expect to hear quite a bit more in the coming weeks and months.
