OpenAI Inc’s biggest investors are pressing the company to reinstate Sam Altman as chief executive officer after the board’s stunning decision to sack him on Friday, people with knowledge of the matter said.
Microsoft Corp, the start-up’s biggest backer with a more than US$10 billion stake, is working with investors including Thrive Capital Management LLC and Tiger Global Management LLC to bring back Altman, said the sources, who asked to remain anonymous discussing private information.
As part of the effort to reinstate the CEO, investors are also pressing for the replacement of the current board, the sources said. The directors have considered stepping down, though they are currently balking at such a move, they said.
Photo: AP
The situation is fluid and final plans have not been set. If the board steps down, investors are reviewing a list of possible new directors. One contender is Bret Taylor, the former co-CEO of Salesforce Inc.
The OpenAI board has been subjected to intense criticism over its decision to remove Altman, which came as a surprise to both investors and to Altman himself.
Over the years, Altman pushed hard to change the company from a nonprofit to a commercially successful business and was the driving force behind new tools that have revolutionized the way people complete tasks from homework to coding. His ouster did not sit well with the firms that backed OpenAI.
Thrive, which was expected to lead a tender offer for employee shares, has not yet wired the money and has made it clear to OpenAI that Altman’s departure would affect its actions.
Thrive, the largest OpenAI investor aside from Microsoft, is working to reinstate both Altman and Greg Brockman, the start-up’s president, who quit on Friday in protest.
Altman is open to returning to the company, some of the sources said.
However, if he were to return, he would ask for changes in the way the company is governed, they said.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has been in touch with Altman and pledged to support him in whatever steps he takes next, the sources said.
Nadella was blindsided by the board’s decision, the sources said.
Several employees, including OpenAI co-founder Brockman, have departed the company in protest following Altman’s ouster. The resignations are likely to continue, the sources said.
If he does not return, Altman has been considering launching a new venture, possibly with former staffers of OpenAI, they said.
In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, venture capitalist Vinod Khosla said that his firm wanted Altman “back at OpenAI but will back him in whatever he does next.”
In a memo to OpenAI staff on Saturday, chief operating officer Brad Lightcap said Altman’s ousting “was not made in response to malfeasance” or the company’s financial or safety practices.
The decision to force Altman out “took us all by surprise,” and he has since spoken with the board to better understand its decision, Lightcap wrote in a memo, which was viewed by Bloomberg.
“This was a breakdown in communication between Sam and the board,” Lightcap wrote, adding that Microsoft “remains fully committed” as an investor.
The government yesterday approved applications by Alphabet Inc’s Google to invest NT$27.08 billion (US$859.98 million) in Taiwan, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said in a statement. The Department of Investment Review approved two investments proposed by Google, with much of the funds to be used for data processing and electronic information supply services, as well as inventory procurement businesses in the semiconductor field, the ministry said. It marks the second consecutive year that Google has applied to increase its investment in Taiwan. Google plans to infuse NT$25.34 billion into Charter Investments Ltd (特許投資顧問) through its Singapore-based subsidiary Fructan Holdings Singapore Pte Ltd, and
SECOND-RATE: Models distilled from US products do not perform the same as the original and undo measures that ensure the systems are neutral, the US’ cable said The US Department of State has ordered a global push to bring attention to what it said are widespread efforts by Chinese companies, including artificial intelligence (AI) start-up DeepSeek (深度求索), to steal intellectual property from US AI labs, according to a diplomatic cable. The cable, dated Friday and sent to diplomatic and consular posts around the world, instructs diplomatic staff to speak to their foreign counterparts about “concerns over adversaries’ extraction and distillation of US AI models.” Distillation is the process of training smaller AI models using output from larger, more expensive ones to lower the costs of training a powerful new
Micron Technology Inc is a driving force pushing the US Congress to pass legislation that would put new export restrictions on equipment its Chinese competitors use to make their chips, according to people familiar with the matter. A US House of Representatives panel yesterday was to vote on the “MATCH Act,” a bill designed to close gaps in restrictions on chipmaking equipment. It would also pressure foreign companies that sell equipment to Chinese chipmaking facilities to align with export curbs on US companies like Lam Research Corp and Applied Materials Inc. The bill targets facilities operated by China’s ChangXin Memory Technologies Inc
Singapore-based ride-hailing and delivery giant Grab Holdings’ planned acquisition of Foodpanda’s Taiwan operations has yet to enter the formal review stage, as regulators await supplementary documents, the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) said yesterday. Acting FTC Chairman Chen Chih-min (陳志民) told the legislature’s Economics Committee that although Grab submitted its application on March 27, the case has not been officially accepted because required materials remain incomplete. Once the filing is finalized, the FTC would launch a formal probe into the deal, focusing on issues such as cross-shareholding and potential restrictions on market competition, Chen told lawmakers. Grab last month announced that it would acquire
RSS