At an all-hands meeting Thursday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman denied that there are plans for him to receive a \u201cgiant equity stake\u201d in the company, calling that information \u201cjust not true,\u201d according to a person who was in attendance.<\/p>\n
Altman and finance chief Sarah Friar both said at the meeting, conducted by video, that investors have raised concerns about Altman not having equity in the high-valued artificial intelligence company that he co-founded almost nine years ago, said the person, who asked not to be named because the gathering was only for employees.<\/p>\n
Regarding his potentially attaining an equity stake, Altman said, \u201cThere are no current plans here,\u201d the person said.<\/p>\n
OpenAI Chairman Bret Taylor told CNBC in a statement that while the board has talked about the matter, no specific figures are on the table.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe board has had discussions about whether it would be beneficial to the company and our mission to have Sam be compensated with equity, but no specific figures have been discussed nor have any decisions been made,\u201d Taylor said.<\/p>\n
The meeting late Thursday followed the board\u2019s decision to consider restructuring the company to a\u00a0for-profit business, according to a separate person with knowledge of the matter. Should the change occur, the nonprofit segment would remain as a separate entity, said the person, who asked not to be named because no plan has been finalized.<\/p>\n
While directors consider OpenAI\u2019s future, key executives continue to walk out the door.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, three execs announced their departures. OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati, who briefly served as interim CEO, said she would be leaving after 6\u00bd years. Later in the day, research chief Bob McGrew and Barret Zoph, a research vice president, said they were leaving the company.<\/p>\n
In an interview Thursday at Italian Tech Week, Altman said, \u201cI think this will be hopefully a great transition for everyone involved and I hope OpenAI will be stronger for it, as we are for all of our transitions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Altman said the departures were not related to the company\u2019s potential restructuring, contrary to some media reports.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the stuff I saw was also just totally wrong,\u201d Altman said at the event in Turin, Italy. \u201cBut we have been thinking about that, our board has, for almost a year independently, as we think about what it takes to get to our next stage. But I think this is just about people being ready for new chapters of their lives and a new generation of leadership.\u201d<\/p>\n
Murati\u00a0wrote\u00a0in a memo to the company that she\u2019s \u201cstepping away because I want to create the time and space to do my own exploration.\u201d She said her focus will be on ensuring a \u201csmooth transition.\u201d<\/p>\n
Before Thursday\u2019s moves, OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever and former safety leader Jan Leike\u00a0announced their departures\u00a0in May. Co-founder John Schulman said last month that he was leaving to join rival Anthropic.<\/p>\n
OpenAI, which is backed by\u00a0Microsoft, is currently pursuing a funding round that would value the company at more than $150 billion, people familiar with the matter told CNBC. Thrive Capital is\u00a0leading the round\u00a0and plans to invest $1 billion, and\u00a0Tiger Global\u00a0is planning to join as well.<\/p>\n
While OpenAI has been in hypergrowth mode since the launch of ChatGPT in late 2022, it\u2019s been simultaneously\u00a0riddled with controversy\u00a0and\u00a0executive departures, with some current and former employees concerned that the company is growing too quickly to operate safely.<\/p>\n
Altman was ousted in November, before being quickly reinstated. Almost all of OpenAI\u2019s employees signed an open letter saying they would leave in response to the board\u2019s action. Days later, Altman was back at the company and Murati moved from\u00a0interim CEO back to the role\u00a0of CTO.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
At an all-hands meeting Thursday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman denied that there are plans for him to receive a \u201cgiant equity stake\u201d in the company, calling that information \u201cjust not true,\u201d according to a person who was in attendance. Altman and finance chief Sarah Friar both said at the meeting, conducted by video, that investors […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":10354,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10353"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10353\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}