What revolt at OpenAI means for Microsoft

Editor’s note (November 22nd 2023): OpenAI said it had agreed “in principle” that Sam Altman would rejoin the artificial-intelligence firm as its chief executive under a new board.

“The mission continues,” tweeted Sam Altman, the co-founder of OpenAI, the startup behind ChatGPT, on November 19th. But precisely where it will continue remains unclear. Mr Altman’s tweet was part of an announcement that he was joining Microsoft. Two days earlier, to the astonishment of Silicon Valley, he had been fired from Openai for not being “consistently candid in his communications with the board”. Then Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s boss, announced that Mr Altman would “lead a new advanced AI [artificial intelligence] research team” within the tech giant. At first it looked like Mr Altman would be accompanied by just a few former colleagues. Many more may follow. The vast majority of OpenAI’s 770 staff have signed a letter threatening to resign if the board fails to reinstate Mr Altman.