OpenAI’s board of directors is attempting to close the door on a tumultuous chapter that saw its venerated CEO Sam Altman fired, exalted and then reinstated as CEO in a chaotic four-day span. In a summary made public today, law firm WilmerHale concluded that the board did not realize that firing the CEO would “destabilize” the company and that it acted without allowing Altman to address the board’s concerns about a “ loss of trust” between directors and managers. management. The review determined that the board had “broad discretion” to fire Altman, but that “his conduct did not warrant removal.”
The company released the summary of WilmerHale’s findings in a blog post today, but went no further than absolving the board for firing Altman, while also finding that the board should not have fired Altman. The published review also puts to rest speculation that Altman was up to something nefarious that led the board to act quickly to oust him. According to the summary, Altman’s firing was “not due to concerns regarding product safety, the pace of development, OpenAI’s finances, or its representations to investors, customers, or business partners.” He stopped short of explaining what the “loss of confidence” stemmed from or how it worsened until Altman’s termination from the company.
The board has since recruited new members, all women, and it appears the company hopes to move forward with a clean slate and a revamped board.
“We unanimously concluded that Sam and Greg are the right leaders for OpenAI,” said Bret Taylor, chairman of OpenAI’s board of directors, referring to Altman and Greg Brockman, who resigned in protest after the board dumped Altman during a virtual meeting on Nov. 11, 2019. 17, 2023. Brockman returned at the same time as Altman last year and both will now officially rejoin the board, the company said today.
The independent investigation into the board’s firing of Altman and the pair’s removal from the board included “dozens of interviews” with former OpenAI board members, executives and consultants, the company said in a blog post. Lawyers reviewed 30,000 documents and assessed the board’s actions. “Many OpenAI employees, as well as current and former board members,” collaborated on the review process, the company said.
“WilmerHale found that there had been a breakdown of trust between the previous board of directors and Mr. Altman that precipitated the events of November 17,” WilmerHale’s summary of findings states.
Altman’s firing set off reverberations throughout the tech industry, where Altman had been the face of generative artificial intelligence. OpenAI also maintains close ties with Microsoft, which has invested $13 billion in the company. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella openly supported Altman after his ouster. At the time, OpenAI’s board of directors simply stated that it “no longer had confidence in his ability to continue to lead OpenAI.” This followed an earlier review that found Altman had not been truthful to the board, the company said. After the board eliminated Altman, board chair Brockman, who was unaware of what the rest of the board was doing, resigned and posted the message on X. Hundreds of employees followed with an open letter to the board asking for their reinstatement. although the latter retained his job as chief scientist and publicly expressed regret for his role in ousting Altman
The transition from the disturbing power struggle at the top coincides with an exciting chapter in which artificial intelligence has seen a meteoric rise in popularity and valuation. Open AI was founded as a non-profit organization in 2015, which owns and controls the for-profit entity OpenAI GP LLC.
“We recognize the importance of our role in stewarding transformative technologies for global good,” Taylor said in the company statement.
The company also announced three new board members today: Sue Desmond-Hellman, former CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Nicole Seligman, former president and general counsel of Sony Corporation; and Fidji Simo, CEO and president of Instacart. The appointments could be seen as a counter to previous criticism that the board had a lack of female representation following Altman’s departure. When he and Brockman reunited, three board members – Tasha McCauley, Helen Toner and co-founder, Ilya Sutskever – left the board. Sutskever remains with the company.
Desmond-Hellman, 66, also serves on Pfizer’s board of directors and previously served as a director on the boards of Facebook and Procter & Gamble. Bigwig Seligman, before Sony, was a partner at the law firm Williams & Connolly, where he advised President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton. Seligman chairs the nominating and corporate governance committee of space exploration company Intuitive Machines and serves on the boards of gene therapy developer Meira GTx Holdings and Paramount Global, formerly known as Viacom. Simo is French and previously served as vice president and head of the Facebook app. He is also a member of the board of directors of Shopify.