Meanwhile, some new details emerged about the days leading up to Altman’s firing. “In the weeks leading up to his shocking ouster from OpenAI, Sam Altman was actively working to raise billions from some of the world’s largest investors for a new chip venture,” Bloomberg reported. Altman reportedly was traveling in the Middle East to raise money for “an AI-focused chip company” that would compete against Nvidia.
As Bloomberg wrote, “The board and Altman had differences of opinion on AI safety, the speed of development of the technology and the commercialization of the company, according to a person familiar with the matter. Altman’s ambitions and side ventures added complexity to an already strained relationship with the board.”
“According to people familiar with the board’s thinking, members had grown so untrusting of Altman that they felt it necessary to double-check nearly everything he told them,” the WSJ report said. The sources said it wasn’t a single incident that led to the firing, “but a consistent, slow erosion of trust over time that made them increasingly uneasy,” the WSJ article said. “Also complicating matters were Altman’s mounting list of outside AI-related ventures, which raised questions for the board about how OpenAI’s technology or intellectual property could be used.”
Why didn’t the board mention any of this when they were asked about why he was fired?
Because it’s still not a good justification?
‘We can’t trust anything our CEO says’ isn’t a good justification?
No. They destabilized the value of the company and put their partnerships at risk. It was a dumb move and has had the expected outcome.
The whole purpose of the board is to provide a safety valve. If the CEO is hiding stuff from the board then that seems like a completely legitimate reason to throw out a CEO. It’s hard to be a safety valve when the CEO is actively hiding information from the board to make the decisions they need to make.