OpenAI co-founder and CEO Sam Altman, and president Greg Brockman expressed shock and sadness after being fired from the company.
What Happened: Former OpenAI president Brockman issued a statement revealing that he was fired along with Altman over a Google Meet call.
While Brockman has been removed as the company's president, he still remains an employee of the company and will report directly to the interim CEO and current CTO, Mira Murati.
"Sam and I are shocked and saddened by what the board did today," said Brockman in a statement posted on X, formerly Twitter.
Interestingly, OpenAI's chief scientist, co-founder, and board member, Ilya Sutskever was the one who informed both Altman and Brockman that they were being fired from their positions.
"Last night, Sam got a text from Ilya asking to talk at noon Friday. Sam joined a Google Meet and the whole board, except Greg, was there. Ilya told Sam he was being fired," Brockman said, narrating the chain of events, underlining that he was not present nor informed about Altman's ouster.
Minutes later, Brockman received a text from Ilya for a "quick call".
"At 12:23pm, Ilya sent a Google Meet link. Greg was told that he was being removed from the board (but was vital to the company and would retain his role) and that Sam had been fired," Brockman said.
OpenAI's single largest investor, Microsoft Corp. MSFT, was only informed about Altman's firing a minute before the company made the announcement.
Responding to the allegations of a palace coup, Sutskever said "You can call it this way."
"This was the board doing its duty to the mission of nonprofit, which is to make sure that OpenAI builds AGI that benefits all of humanity," Sutskever added.
Palace coup or not, Altman's firing has shocked the tech industry, with several Silicon Valley CEOs, including Box's Aaron Levie and Airbnb's Brian Chesky expressing shock.
“Sam Altman and Greg Brockman have my full support. I’m saddened by what’s transpired. They, and the rest of the OpenAI team, deserve better,” Chesky said.
While both Altman and Brockman have thanked everyone for supporting them in the aftermath of the "coup", Altman just posted a cryptic message on X.
"If I start going off, the OpenAI board should go after me for the full value of my shares," he said.
This may not be the last we've heard of Altman's ouster from OpenAI.
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