Sam Altman's firing and rehiring

Extracted Attributes

• Event Type

  CEO Firing and Rehiring

• Key Consequence

  Formation of a new OpenAI board

• Duration of Ouster

  5 days (from public announcement to agreement)

• Organization Involved

  OpenAI

• Primary Entity Involved

  Sam Altman

• Date of Official Rehiring

  2023-11-29

• Date of Board Vote to Fire

  2023-11-16

• Date of Agreement to Rehire

  2023-11-22

• Board's Stated Reason for Firing

  Lack of confidence in leadership, not consistently candid in communications

• Altman's Stated Reason for Firing

  Cultural clash with OpenAI Nonprofit Board over pace and methods for pursuing safe AGI

• Date of Public Firing Announcement

  2023-11-17

Timeline

• OpenAI's independent board members and Ilya Sutskever voted to fire Sam Altman as CEO. Greg Brockman was also removed from the board. (Source: Web Search Results)

  2023-11-16

• OpenAI publicly announced Sam Altman's departure as CEO, stating he 'was not consistently candid in his communications with the board.' Mira Murati was appointed as interim CEO. (Source: Web Search Results)

  2023-11-17

• Sam Altman's firing became a top global news story, leading to significant backlash from OpenAI employees and investors. (Source: Web Search Results)

  2023-11-17

• Emmett Shear was appointed as interim CEO, replacing Mira Murati. (Source: Web Search Results)

  2023-11-21

• Sam Altman reached an agreement in principle to return as CEO of OpenAI, announced late Tuesday night. (Source: Web Search Results)

  2023-11-22

• Sam Altman was officially reinstated as CEO of OpenAI. A new initial board was formed, consisting of Bret Taylor (chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D'Angelo. (Source: Web Search Results)

  2023-11-29

Sam Altman

Samuel Harris Gibstine Altman (born April 22, 1985) is an American entrepreneur, investor, and chief executive officer of OpenAI since 2019. He is considered one of the leading figures of the AI boom. Altman dropped out of Stanford University after two years and founded Loopt, a mobile social networking service, raising more than $30 million in venture capital. In 2011, Altman joined Y Combinator, a startup accelerator, and was its president from 2014 to 2019. In 2019, he became CEO of OpenAI and oversaw the successful launch of ChatGPT in 2022. He was ousted from the role by the company's board in 2023 due to a lack of confidence in his leadership, but was reinstated five days later following significant backlash from employees and investors, after which a new board was formed. He has served as chairman of clean energy companies Helion Energy and Oklo (until April 2025). As of July 2025, Altman's net worth is estimated at US$1.8 billion.

Web Search Results

• 'Super caught off guard': Open AI CEO talks about getting fired, rehired

  # 'Super caught off guard': Open AI CEO talks about getting fired, rehired Board said it no longer had confidence 'in his ability to continue leading' OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has revealed that he was "super caught off guard" after he was terminated by the organisation's board in November. Altman's firing and eventual rehiring became massive news in late 2023 as OpenAI's ChatGPT was skyrocketing to popularity and gaining widespread use across the world. [...] "I never intended to harm OpenAI. I love everything we've built together, and I will do everything I can to reunite the company," Sutskever said on the platform. ## Rehiring Altman Amid strong pressure from its employees, as well as blowback from investors, OpenAI has brought back Altman as CEO on November 29, just days after the company announced his departure. Altman's reinstatement comes with a new initial board consisting of Larry Summers, Adam D'Angelo, and Bret Taylor as the chair. [...] Altman was briefly sacked by OpenAI's board in November, who said he was "not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities." "The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI," the board previously said in a statement. Altman was temporarily replaced by chief technology officer Mira Murati, and then by ex-Twitch CEO Emmett Shear.

• What Sam Altman's firing and rehiring reveals about OpenAI

  # What Sam Altman’s firing and rehiring reveals about OpenAI | TechCrunch Minute ## TechCrunch 649000 subscribers 20 likes ### Description 1148 views Posted: 30 May 2024 We may be getting a little more clarity on what was going on behind OpenAI’s closed doors when Sam Altman was fired and then re-hired as CEO back in November. Former board member Helen Toner has given an interview with the Ted AI podcast sharing more about her side of the story, accusing Altman of “outright lying” to the board. [...] an open aai board member says the CEO was fired for outright lying you probably remember a dramatic story from November of last year when open ai's board fired the CEO Sam Alman What followed was an incredibly complicated power struggle that ultimately saw Alman returning to the role of CEO and the board that opposed him pushed out since then there's been a lot of reporting about what was happening behind the scenes but what's remained pretty vague is why the board felt they had to take such a [...] when chat GPT launched the board members weren't told and they had to find out from Twitter toner also said Alman gave the board inaccurate information about the safety measures that were in place at the company and he didn't disclose his ownership of the open aai startup fund lastly she said these aren't new issues for Alman that in fact he'd been fired from his job running the accelerator Y combinator and that there were also management issues at his last startup looped as for why the board

• How Sam Altman was fired and rehired at OpenAI, in only five days

  As they weighed the evidence before them, the board members considered that OpenAI was one of the most promising tech companies on the planet. Surely, they reasoned, they could have their pick of CEOs. So, on the afternoon of Thursday, November 16, 2023, the three independent board members and Sutskever voted to fire Altman. They also voted to remove Greg Brockman, OpenAI’s president, another Altman ally and board member, who was perceived to be a destabilising influence. [...] To bring the matter to a close, D’Angelo suggested the former US Treasury secretary Lawrence Summers as a new board member. Altman agreed and gave up his demand for a board seat. By Tuesday, the deal was done: Altman would return to OpenAI as chief executive but not to the board, and there would be an independent investigation into the circumstances of his firing. Sutskever, Toner and Macauley would step down from the board. [...] Advertisement Shortly after, Altman was locked out of his computer. The first few moments were pure incredulity. Then the anger came. Minutes later, the news went public via a terse blog post on the OpenAI website that simply said “he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board”. The news of Altman’s firing instantly became the top story around the world. Altman’s iPhone was getting so many text messages per second that his iMessage app crashed.

• 4 days from fired to re-hired: A timeline of Sam Altman's ouster from ...

  Friday, November 17 – Altman stepped down from his role as CEO of OpenAI, the company announced, following a review undertaken by the company's board of directors. "Mr. Altman's departure follows a deliberative review process by the board, which concluded that he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities," OpenAI said in a statement. "The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI." [...] breakingPeople trapped under rubble after explosion at steel plant, rescue operation underway # 4 days from fired to re-hired: A timeline of Sam Altman's ouster from OpenAI Altman returned as CEO of the company just days after his sudden exit. ByMax Zahn November 22, 2023, 9:51 AM Sam Altman has reached an agreement in principle to return as CEO of OpenAI, the company announced late Tuesday night in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. [...] "We look forward to getting to know Emmett Shear and OAI's new leadership team and working with them," Nadella posted on X. "And we're extremely excited to share the news that Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, together with colleagues, will be joining Microsoft to lead a new advanced AI research team." In a repost of the announcement, Altman commented: "The mission continues."

• Removal of Sam Altman from OpenAI - Wikipedia

  71. ^ Getahun, Hannah. "Sam Altman addresses 'potential equity cancellation' in OpenAI exit agreements after 2 high-profile departures". Business Insider. Retrieved May 19, 2024. 72. ^ Lawler, Richard (May 29, 2024). "Former OpenAI board member explains why they fired Sam Altman". The Verge. Retrieved May 30, 2024. 73. ^ Field, Hayden (May 29, 2024). "Former OpenAI board member explains why CEO Sam Altman got fired before he was rehired". CNBC. Retrieved May 30, 2024. [...] and businesswoman Laurene Powell Jobs were also considered. Murati had intended to rehire Altman and Brockman, discussing the move with Adam D'Angelo. The Verge reported that Altman intended to return to OpenAI with support from Sutskever.