Microsoft secures non-voting board seat at OpenAI

Microsoft
will
have
a
non-voting
board
seat
at
OpenAI,
the
company

announced
on
Wednesday.

The
move
quells
some
of
the
remaining
questions
about
Microsoft’s
interest
in
the
startup
after
a
turbulent
month
that
saw
the
company’s
controlling
non-profit
board
fire
and
then

re-hire
CEO
Sam
Altman.

OpenAI’s
outlook
has
been
intertwined
with
Microsoft
since
the
software
giant
invested
$13
billion
into
OpenAI
and
integrated
its
AI
models
into
Office
and
other
Microsoft
programs.
Previously,
Microsoft
did
not
have
official
representation
on
the
board
of
directors
that
controlled
the
startup,
allowing
it
to
be
surprised
when
Altman
was
first
fired.

“We
clearly
made
the
right
choice
to
partner
with
Microsoft
and
I’m
excited
that
our
new
board
will
include
them
as
a
non-voting
observer,”
Altman
said
in
a
note
to
staff
posted
on
OpenAI’s
website.

Altman
commended
the
team
and
said
that
OpenAI
did
not
lose
any
employees
in
the
upheaval.

“Now
that
we’re
through
all
of
this,
we
didn’t
lose
a
single
employee.
You
stood
firm
for
each
other,
this
company,
and
our
mission,”
Altman
wrote.

Altman
said
in
his
note
that
a
board
of
directors
—
including
former
Salesforce
CEO
Bret
Taylor,
former
Treasury
Secretary
Larry
Summers
and
Quora
CEO
Adam
D’Angelo
—
would
build
out
a
new
board
of
directors
for
the
startup.

Mira
Murati,
who
had
been
OpenAI’s
CTO
and
was
briefly
named
interim
CEO
earlier
this
month,
is
the
company’s
CTO
once
again,
and
Greg
Brockman
has
returned
as
OpenAI
president.

Taylor,
who
will
lead
the
new
board,
said
in
a
message
posted
on
OpenAI’s
website
that
he
was
focused
on
“strengthening
OpenAI’s
corporate
governance.”
In
a
subsequent
post
on
X,
formerly
Twitter,
Taylor
said
that
he
would
leave
the
board
after
it’s
fully
staffed
and
the
company
is
stabilized.

“As
I
have
communicated
to
board
colleagues
and
management,
when
these
transitional
tasks
have
been
completed,
I
intend
to
step
away
and
leave
the
oversight
of
OpenAI
in
the
good
hands
of
board
colleagues,”
Taylor
tweeted.

A
Microsoft
spokesperson
declined
to
identify
the
person
who
will
join
the
OpenAI
board
meetings
but
will
not
have
a
vote.

Most
board
members,
including
cofounder
and
chief
scientist
Ilya
Sutskever,
who
were
serving
at
the
time
Altman
was
removed,
have

left
the
board,
except
for
D’Angelo.

The
reasons
for
Altman’s
firing
remain
unclear.
While
the
board
cited
a
lack
of
transparency,
issues
over
so-called
“AI
safety”
and
debates
over
whether
the
company
should
slow
down
its
development
of
powerful
AI
it
calls
AGI
could
have
been
a
factor.

Helen
Toner,
who
had
been
an
OpenAI
board
member
since
2021,
resigned
from
her
role
Wednesday.
In
a
post
on
X,
she
wrote,
“To
be
clear:
our
decision
was
about
the
board’s
ability
to
effectively
supervise
the
company,
which
was
our
role
and
responsibility.
Though
there
has
been
speculation,
we
were
not
motivated
by
a
desire
to
slow
down
OpenAI’s
work.”

Toner
has
been
a
director
of
strategy
for
Georgetown’s
Center
for
Security
and
Emerging
Technology
for
nearly
five
years,
and
also
has
spent
time
at
the
University
of
Oxford’s
Center
for
the
Governance
of
AI.
She
has
also
given
a
talk
to
the
effective
altruism
community
and
been
involved
in
its
discussion
forum.

“Building
AI
systems
that
are
safe,
reliable,
fair,
and
interpretable
is
an
enormous
open
problem,”
Toner told the
Journal
of
Political
Risk
last
year.
“Organizations
building
and
deploying
AI
will
also
have
to
recognize
that
beating
their
competitors
to
market
—
or
to
the
battlefield
—
is
to
no
avail
if
the
systems
they’re
fielding
are
buggy,
hackable,
or
unpredictable.”

In
a
post
on
X,
Altman
mentioned
Toner’s
resignation
and seemed
to
confirm
Tasha
McCauley’s
as
well. McCauley,
who
had
been
an
OpenAI
board
member
since
2018,
is
an
adjunct
senior
management
scientist
at
Rand
Corporation.

“The
best
interests
of
the
company
and
the
mission
always
come
first,”
Altman
wrote
in
a
post
on
X.
“It
is
clear
that
there
were
real
misunderstandings
between
me
and
members
of
the
board.
For
my
part,
it
is
incredibly
important
to
learn
from
this
experience
and
apply
those
learnings
as
we
move
forward
as
a
company.
I
welcome
the
board’s
independent
review
of
all
recent
events.
I
am
thankful
to
Helen
and
Tasha
for
their
contributions
to
the
strength
of
OpenAI.”