OpenAI Gets A New Board Of Directors, Sam Altman Reinstated

Sam Altman has been reappointed to the OpenAI board of directors after an investigation by law firm WilmerHale.
Three additional members have also been elected — all of them are women.
It’s believed that this is to do away with the criticism the company received for its lack of diversity.

A third-party investigation into the inner turmoil of OpenAI that led to the firing and rehiring of CEO Sam Altman has gone in his favor and he has been reinstated to the board of directors.

Along with him, 3 new board members will also be joining the table. This’ll include:

ex-Sony Entertainment president Nicole Seligman,
former CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Sue Desmond-Hellmann, and
Instacart CEO Fidji Simo.

Experts believe that this new board will help restore the faith of investors in the company and show that the company has been able to move past the conflicts.

The transitory board that was appointed post Altman’s removal will stay in place. The said board consisted of Quora CEO Adam D’Angelo, Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor, economist Larry Summers, and Dee Templeton, who is an observer appointed by Microsoft.

Together, they bring the total count of the board of directions to eight. The new board has promised to do the following:

Revise the company’s governance structure
Adopt new corporate governance
Create better policies for handling conflicts of interest
Create a hotline for the staff to submit anonymous reports.

It’s important to note that all three of the new members are women. That’s because OpenAI’s original all-male members drew a lot of controversy, especially because Larry Summers has been known for making unwanted remarks about women. So, this is perhaps another attempt to clear the company’s image.

The company even received a letter from The Congressional Black Caucus who made a remark on the lack of diversity in the team and the need for black people and their perspective in building AI tools.

Read More: Sam Altman plans to raise $7 trillion for his upcoming AI chip project

Why Was Sam Altman Fired In November?

The investigation led by law firm WilmerHale concluded that it was all a result of the “breakdown in the relationship and loss of trust” between Atlman and his then-board of directors. However, although the circumstances were unfortunate, there was not enough cause for his removal.

The company’s chief technology officer Mira Murati also questioned Sam’s management style.

That’s not to say that the board violated any rule. During the investigation, WilmerHale conducted several interviews with board members, executives, witnesses, and other staff and found that while the board was well within its right to remove Altman, it wasn’t entirely necessary.

However, there’s another side to the story. An investigation conducted by the New York Times paints a different picture. It shows Altman as a manipulative person — someone who tells people what they want to hear — as described by chief scientist Ilya Sutskever.

The rest of the factors surrounding his removal had been a mystery for the last few months. One morning, out of the blue, we heard that Atlman was fired and then a few days later he was reinstated (although he didn’t get his seat on the board back until now).

The only explanation that we got at the time was that Altman was not very transparent with the board and was not consistent with his words. This led some members of the board to believe he was no longer capable of leading the company and hence he was removed.

Sam Altman must have done something right because soon after he left, a lot of OpenAI employees threatened to quit — and board chair Greg Brockman actually quit.

Following this, Altman was soon reinstated as CEO of OpenAI. However, the problems run much deeper.

After countless investigations, we’ve found that it’s the unstable structure of the company that’s causing the chaos. The company was originally founded as a non-profit that would contribute to AI research and help in introducing the technology safely to the masses.

However, OpenAI has transformed into a commercial, profit-driven company that’s still governed by people who believe in the original mission — hence, the conflict. OpenAI’s digression from its original company mission is also why Elon Musk has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI.

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