Microsoft has announced that it has hired two of the co-founders of OpenAI, a research organization dedicated to creating artificial intelligence that can match or surpass human capabilities, to lead its new advanced AI research team.
Ilya Sutskever and Greg Brockman will join Microsoft as corporate vice presidents and report directly to Chief Technology Officer Kevin Scott. They will oversee a team of researchers and engineers working on cutting-edge artificial intelligence projects such as natural language processing, computer vision, reinforcement learning and generative modeling.
Sutskever y Brockman se encuentran entre las figuras más respetadas e influyentes en el campo de la IA. Cofundaron OpenAI en 2015 con la visión de crear inteligencia artificial general (AGI), una forma hipotética de IA que puede realizar cualquier tarea intelectual que un humano pueda realizar. También lideraron el desarrollo de algunos de los sistemas de inteligencia artificial más impresionantes de los últimos años, como GPT-3, un modelo de lenguaje masivo que puede generar textos coherentes y diversos sobre casi cualquier tema.
Microsoft has been collaborating with OpenAI since 2019, when it invested $1 billion in the organization and became its exclusive cloud provider. Microsoft also helped OpenAI build and host its Azure supercomputer, one of the most powerful machines in the world, which is used to train large-scale AI models such as GPT-3.
By hiring Sutskever and Brockman, Microsoft is signaling its commitment to advance the state of the art in AI and compete with other tech giants such as Google, Facebook and Amazon. Microsoft hopes that by combining its own expertise and resources with the talent and vision of the OpenAI co-founders, it will be able to create AI solutions that can benefit society and empower its customers and partners.
“We are delighted to welcome Ilya and Greg to Microsoft,” Scott said in a press release. “They are both brilliant and innovative leaders who have pushed the boundaries of AI research and development. We look forward to working with them and their team to create AI technologies that can solve some of the world’s most challenging problems.”
In a surprise move, OpenAI co-founders Sam Altman and Greg Brockman announced today that they will be leaving the AI research organization to join Microsoft as leaders of a new advanced AI research team. The news was confirmed by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella at X, who welcomed Altman and Brockman to the company and praised their vision and accomplishments in the field of artificial intelligence.
Brockman also shared the news on X and said, “We’re going to build something new and it’s going to be amazing.” He revealed that some of his former colleagues at OpenAI will be joining him and Altman at Microsoft, including Jacob Pachoki, Szymon Sidor and Aleksander Madry, all experts in various aspects of AI research.
The departure of Altman and Brockman leaves OpenAI with a leadership vacuum, which will be filled temporarily by Emmett Shear, former CEO of Twitch, who has been appointed interim CEO. Shear is also a member of OpenAI’s board of directors and has been involved in its operations since its inception. According to Reuters, Shear will oversee OpenAI’s transition to a new leadership team and continue to support its mission and vision.
Nadella also reaffirmed Microsoft’s commitment to partner with OpenAI and support its research projects. He said, “We look forward to meeting Emmett Shear and the new OAI leadership team and working with them.” He added that Microsoft and OpenAI share the common goal of creating beneficial and trusted AI systems that can empower humanity and solve global challenges.
The OpenAI board’s decision to fire Sam Altman, CEO of the artificial intelligence research firm, sparked a wave of protests and resignations from staff and investors, including Microsoft. The board, made up of prominent figures such as Elon Musk, Reid Hoffman and Peter Thiel, cited “irreconcilable differences” with Altman’s vision and leadership style as the reason for his dismissal.
However, the board’s move backfired as many Altman employees and supporters expressed their outrage and disappointment on social media and in internal communications. Some of them accused the board of being out of touch with the company’s mission and values and of trying to interfere with its research agenda and culture. Others claimed that the board was motivated by personal or financial interests and had violated the company’s governance principles.
As a result of the backlash, the board agreed to resign on Saturday and reinstate Altman as CEO. They also welcomed back Greg Brockman, chairman and former president of OpenAI, who resigned in solidarity with Altman on Friday. Brockman and Altman are close friends and rumored to be planning to start a new venture together, even before the board’s intervention.
However, the board’s recall may not be enough to prevent further damage to the company’s reputation and morale. Several senior OpenAI researchers already left the company on Friday and more are expected to follow suit. Some of them have expressed their dissatisfaction with the company’s management and culture, and their desire to pursue more independent and open research elsewhere. The loss of these talented researchers could hamper OpenAI’s ability to fulfill its ambitious vision of creating general artificial intelligence that can benefit humanity.
