OpenAI Co-Founder Leaves for Amazon-Backed Rival Anthropic
Separately, Greg Brockman, a co-founder and company president, posted on X that he would take a sabbatical for the rest of the year
OpenAI co-founder John Schulman is leaving the company to join rival firm Anthropic, an artificial-intelligence startup backed by Amazon.
Schulman said in a post late Monday on social-media platform X that he wanted to focus more on AI alignment. The term refers to the development of safety systems to ensure employees can control the technology they create, in line with a set of human values, even if the tech exceeds human capabilities.
Schulman said he wanted to “start a new chapter of my career where I can return to hands-on technical work.” He said the move wasn’t related to a lack of support for the alignment research being done by OpenAI.
Separately, Greg Brockman, a co-founder and company president, posted on X that he would take a sabbatical for the rest of the year, saying it would be his “first time to relax” since starting up the company nine years ago.
“The mission is far from complete,” Brockman added. “We still have a safe AGI to build.”
Schulman is the latest member of OpenAI’s leadership team to leave in recent months.
Co-founder Ilya Sutskever, who was the startup’s chief scientist, and Jan Leike, another machine-learning researcher who worked closely with Sutskever on managing AI risks, both left in May. Sutskever said he was working on a new project while Leike joined Anthropic.
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