Tuesday Briefing: OpenAI’s Future in Doubt

OpenAI staff threatened to leave The future of OpenAI is in jeopardy after more than 700 of its 770 employees signed a letter yesterday saying they may leave the company for Microsoft if the ousted chief executive, Sam Altman, is not reinstalled at the high-profile artificial intelligence start-up.

OpenAI’s four-person board shocked the tech industry Friday afternoon when it removed Altman, saying it could no longer trust him. The decision by the board set off a frantic weekend that ended with Altman joining Microsoft to start a new A.I. project with Greg Brockman, OpenAI’s president and a company co-founder. Yesterday, OpenAI announced it was in talks to have Altman rejoin the company, only to say the same evening that he would not be returning.

The upheaval leaves the future of one of the fastest-growing companies in Silicon Valley history in doubt.

Winners and losers: My colleague Kevin Roose, wrote that the situation was an overall loss for OpenAI, leaving its leadership and morale in shambles. It was a win for Microsoft, which has invested $13 billion in OpenAI and will be able to continue using the start-up’s models to power its own products, while also giving a new, Altman-led team the money it needs to build new Microsoft-owned models.