Microsoft will hire Sam Altman, the co-founder and former number one of the start-up OpenAI, announced Monday, November 20, Satya Nadella, the boss of the American giant, three days after the announcement of the dismissal of the Silicon star Valley.
Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, both co-founders of OpenAI, “will join a new AI research team within Microsoft,” Mr. Nadella wrote on X (formerly Twitter). OpenAI is the startup that launched the generative artificial intelligence (AI) platform ChatGPT. “The mission continues,” replied Sam Altman on the same social network.
In his message, Satya Nadella also confirmed the arrival at the head of OpenAI of Emmett Shear, the co-founder of Twitch. The latter had resigned from the live video platform. “We look forward to getting to know and working with Emmett Shear and the new OpenAI leadership team,” said Nadella.
Silicon Valley star
Microsoft has invested several billion dollars in OpenAI and has integrated the technology into its own products, such as the Bing search engine. The OpenAI board of directors created a surprise on Friday by announcing the dismissal with immediate effect of the Silicon Valley star following “a deliberative review process by the board, which concluded that he ‘had not always been forthright in his communications with the board, hindering his ability to fulfill his responsibilities’.
This body no longer has “confidence in its ability to lead OpenAI,” she then added. Several managers of the company founded at the end of 2015 have since announced their resignations, in particular the chairman of the board of directors, Greg Brockman.
The release of the first version of ChatGPT on November 30, 2022, kicked off a race in artificial intelligence. Widely considered a revolution comparable to the advent of the Internet, generative AI makes it possible to produce texts, lines of code, images and sounds upon simple request in everyday language. It also raises serious concerns about the dangers for democracy (massive disinformation) or employment (replaced professions), in particular.