OpenAI announces return of Sam Altman as chief executive

Sam Altman will return to OpenAI after an agreement in principle was reached, the company has announced.

Posting on X, formerly known as Twitter , OpenAI also announced a new initial board of former Salesforce chief executive Bret Taylor, the former US treasury secretary Larry Summers and Quora chief executive Adam D’Angelo.

Mr Altman also posted, saying “i love openai, and everything i’ve done over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together.”

Last week the board of OpenAI, which created the ChatGPT artificial intelligence tool, said it had pushed Mr Altman out after a review found he was “not consistently candid in his communications” with the board.

Greg Brockman, the company’s president and co-founder, who left in protest at Mr Altman’s sacking said on X: “Amazing progress made today. We will come back stronger and more unified than ever.”

“Returning to AI & getting back to coding tonight,” Mr Brockman added.

The previous board of directors, which included Mr D’Angelo and Mr Brockman, refused to give specific reasons to why they fired Mr Altman last Friday.

This led to mounting pressure within the company to reinstate Mr Altman, including a threatened exodus of nearly all of the company’s 770 employees.

Microsoft, which has invested billions of dollars in OpenAI, moved to hire Mr Altman and Mr Brockman on Monday.

In a post on social media on Wednesday morning, the chairman and chief executive of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, said he is “encouraged by the changes to the OpenAI board”.

“We believe this is a first essential step on a path to more stable, well-informed, and effective governance.”