Sam Altman has officially joined Microsoft, as revealed by the tech giant’s CEO Satya Nadella on X. Tagging alongside him is fellow OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman, as well as several former members of the artificial intelligence research organisation.
“We’re extremely excited to share the news that Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, together with colleagues, will be joining Microsoft to lead a new advanced AI research team,” said Nadella. “We look forward to moving quickly to provide them with the resources needed for their success.”
We remain committed to our partnership with OpenAI and have confidence in our product roadmap, our ability to continue to innovate with everything we announced at Microsoft Ignite, and in continuing to support our customers and partners. We look forward to getting to know Emmett…
— Satya Nadella (@satyanadella) November 20, 2023
Acknowledging his newfound role at Microsoft, Altman simply reposted the announcement with the message “the mission continues.” In a following tweet, Nadella further revealed that the former OpenAI head will act as CEO for the newly formed group, setting a new pace for innovation through the tech giant.
“We are going to build something new and it will be incredible,” said Brockman on X. In the same post, he also revealed that other OpenAI key talents leading the new Microsoft-established team will include former director of research Jakub Pachocki, former research scientist Szymon Sidor, and former head of preparedness Aleksander Madry.
I’m super excited to have you join as CEO of this new group, Sam, setting a new pace for innovation. We’ve learned a lot over the years about how to give founders and innovators space to build independent identities and cultures within Microsoft, including GitHub, Mojang Studios,…
— Satya Nadella (@satyanadella) November 20, 2023
And it looks like others could join both Altman and Brockman soon, with many of the firm’s employees posting “OpenAI is nothing without its people” on X, indicating that even more walkouts could potentially happen. If true, this would definitely cause an issue for OpenAI and its board of directors, which had recently named former Twitch co-founder Emmett Shear as its interim CEO.
We are going to build something new & it will be incredible.
Initial leadership (more soon): @merettm @sidorszymon @aleks_madry @sama @gdb
The mission continues. https://t.co/oAerJnMYQm
— Greg Brockman (@gdb) November 20, 2023
On that note, Nadella expressed that Microsoft is looking forward to working with Shear, as well as the firm’s new leadership team. “We remain committed to our partnership with OpenAI and have confidence in our product roadmap, our ability to continue to innovate with everything we announced at Microsoft Ignite, and in continuing to support our customers and partners,” he said on X.
