John Schulman, one of OpenAI's co-founders and a key architect of its ChatGPT chatbot, has left the company to join its chief rival, Anthropic. The news was released Monday and marks the latest in a series of significant departures from the artificial intelligence company in recent months.
Schulman will work at Anthropic on alignment research to ensure that AI systems align with human values. Anthropic, a start-up founded in 2021 by former OpenAI researchers, focuses on safety in AI development. Schulman's departure follows that of Ilya Sutskever, another of OpenAI's co-founders and its former chief scientist, along with other team members. In a note to colleagues, Schulman expressed his desire to delve deeper into alignment research and begin a new career phase.
Greg Brockman, president of OpenAI, also announced Monday that he will take the rest of the year off. Brockman wrote on the social network X that it was the first time he had relaxed since co-founding OpenAI nine years ago, noting that there is still much work to be done to build secure general artificial intelligence.
Schulman's departure and Brockman's announcement follow a tumultuous period at OpenAI. Since launching ChatGPT in November 2022, the company has reached a valuation of $86 billion and launched a series of chatbots capable of performing increasingly complex tasks.
OpenAI has faced criticism for the speed of its AI development and the direction of its research. These concerns were voiced during a board crisis in November when Brockman and CEO Sam Altman were ousted and reinstated within five days following a campaign by employees and investors.
The Financial Times reported that Elon Musk, who helped launch OpenAI but left the board in 2018, filed a lawsuit Monday. Musk alleges that OpenAI and its CEO have reneged on their mission to benefit humanity by partnering commercially with Microsoft, which has committed $13 billion to OpenAI since 2019.
Other senior members have also left OpenAI to pursue their projects. Jan Leike, a prominent member of Sutskever's "superalignment" team, left the company in May and criticized its efforts to ensure that AI is developed and deployed responsibly. Andrej Karpathy, another founding member of OpenAI in 2015, left in February to work on his AI project. In response to Schulman's departure, OpenAI expressed its gratitude for his contributions and noted that his passion and effort have laid a solid foundation for future innovations at the company and in the field of AI.
The series of recent departures at OpenAI underscores the challenges and tensions within the AI industry, especially around security and the direction of advanced technology development.