Why OpenAI reversed course and brought Sam Altman back as CEO

Geoff Bennett:

Sam Altman is back as the chief executive of OpenAI.

The hot tech start-up behind ChatGPT not only brought Altman back; it's also overhauling the board that fired him with new directors, ending a dramatic five-day standoff that's transfixed Silicon Valley and the artificial intelligence industry.

Mike Isaac is back with us. He covers tech for The New York Times.

All right, Mike, so Sam Altman was asked by the board on Friday. By Monday, Microsoft announced that they'd hired him, which is when we last spoke. And then, late yesterday, OpenAI says, actually, Sam Altman's coming back as chief executive. What is going on?

(Laughter)

Mike Isaac, The New York Times:

Oh, my gosh. I don't know how much I slept since the last time I talked to you, but it has been a whirlwind series of events over the past five days.

Basically, the subtext, I think, here is, essentially Microsoft, which has a strong partnership with OpenAI, was using their hiring of Sam and a lot of his executive team as a kind of bargaining chip to basically keep OpenAI still alive. It's a very important A.I. company for Microsoft.

A lot of investors have a lot of money tied up in it. And they would have rather used an independent OpenAI with a partnership in Microsoft, rather than build the whole thing inside of Microsoft from scratch. So, essentially, it was a bargaining sort of negotiation between OpenAI's small board of directors versus Sam Altman and his sort of allies, as well as Microsoft.

And it seems like Sam Altman at least won for today. We will see what the board looks like in the future, as they begin to expand it more beyond what's called a preliminary board that they just appointed.

Geoff Bennett:

So what can you tell us about this new board, its current members, and how their vision aligns with Sam Altman's vision?

Mike Isaac:

Totally.

So, one of the big sticking points that this didn't get done over the weekend is exactly that, the composition of the board. The previous board, basically, some of the criticisms were, it was a little off base, Sam had been slowly whittling it down.

The new board is very revamped. One person remains. His name's Adam D'Angelo, former Facebooker and CEO of Quora. He was the person trying to reign in Sam Altman for not being consistently candid, which is the reason they fired him.

And the other two are a man named Bret Taylor, a longtime Facebook and Silicon Valley executive who's seen kind of as a Switzerland, pretty neutral and pretty respectable guy in the valley, as well as Larry Summer, the former Treasury — sorry — Larry Summers, the former Treasury secretary of the United States and someone who actually sits on a number of other tech company boards and has a real, deep interest in A.I. and how it'll affect the future of work and jobs across the world.

Geoff Bennett:

So, when we spoke on Monday, you sort of framed this fight between one versus safety versus the acceleration of the technology.

So now where do we stand? What does all of this mean for the broader A.I. sector?

Mike Isaac:

So I think this — the fight continues as far as the exact dynamic you're talking about. There's the folks called accelerationists, which sounds very futuristic, but, essentially, their idea is push the tech forward as fast as possible so we can use it to help humans.

And there are the folks who are essentially like, let's slow this down and keep it safer. And I think the newly reformed board, which will expand in the days ahead, is probably going to be more balanced and in the favor of checks and balances that weren't necessarily there before around Mr. Altman, who kind of plays fast and loose with safety, according to his critics.

I do think that they're going to try to make an even and balanced board, because they don't want this to happen ever again if they don't want the company to be killed by a revolt from its employees and its former CEO, now returning CEO.

Geoff Bennett:

Yes.

Mike Isaac, I have to say, I didn't expect to speak to you twice in one week, but I appreciate the opportunity.

(Laughter)

Geoff Bennett:

Thanks so much for being with us.

Mike Isaac:

Thanks, Geoff. Appreciate it.