After a weekend of drama, the board of OpenAI has decided not to reinstate CEO Sam Altman, who was ousted from the position on Friday in a move that shocked Silicon Valley.
Instead, the board will install Emmett Shear, the former CEO of Twitch, as its new interim CEO, Shear confirmed on Twitter. The news, which was first reported by The Information, follows an astonishing weekend of back-and-forth intrigue about the future of the groundbreaking company. On Friday, Altman and president Greg Brockman were suddenly let go amid apparent disputes about AI safety, and the company’s CTO, Mira Murati, was installed as interim CEO.
By Sunday, the company’s investors were reportedly pushing the board to rehire Altman—who returned to OpenAI’s offices for negotiations. But late Sunday evening, news broke that Shear would be named interim CEO. Shear was one of the founders of Justin.TV, the live-streaming site that eventually spun off Twitch (purchased by Amazon in 2014 for nearly $1 billion), where Shear became CEO. He resigned from that position in March 2023.
The news will have large ramifications across the tech industry. Microsoft, which is one of OpenAI’s largest investors and is using OpenAI products as the foundation of its own forays into AI, already saw its stock tumble Friday after the news of Altman’s departure broke. And many OpenAI employees signaled over the weekend that they supported Altman and Brockman, who could potentially start their own new venture—and possibly take many of those employees with them.
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