#Microsoft #Strikes #OpenAI #Hiring #Altman #Brockman
Three hours after OpenAI co-founder and board director Ilya Sutskever told staff Sam Altman would not return as chief executive officer, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said Altman, former OpenAI President Greg Brockman and other OpenAI employees would join Microsoft to lead “a new advanced AI research team.”
The move shows how Microsoft hastily tried to overcome the shock firing of Altman on Friday by OpenAI’s board of directors. Microsoft has committed more than $11 billion to OpenAI, including in the form of computing power, in exchange for the ability to use OpenAI technology, sell it to Microsoft cloud customers, and take a cut of future OpenAI profits. The arrangement was showing promising dividens for Microsoft before the sudden ouster of Altman, which prompted other key OpenAI staff to quit in protest and could impact Microsoft’s business.
