Mira Murati, OpenAI’s Chief Technology Officer, Steps Down

Mira Murati, OpenAI’s Chief Technology Officer, announced on Wednesday her decision to leave the company after more than six years. Murati, who played a key role in developing ChatGPT and the DALL-E image generator, described her time at OpenAI as a “privilege” in a message to the team, which she also shared on X (formerly Twitter). While expressing her deep connection to the company, Murati stated that “this moment feels right” to move on.

I shared the following note with the OpenAI team today. pic.twitter.com/nsZ4khI06P

— Mira Murati (@miramurati) September 25, 2024

Her departure adds to the list of high-profile exits from OpenAI as the organization faces significant changes. The company, initially founded as a non-profit AI research lab, has been considering restructuring to increase financial returns for investors. OpenAI is reportedly in talks about a new fundraising round that could value it at $150 billion.

Murati’s resignation follows the exits of several other key figures, including co-founder and chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, who left in May to focus on developing safer AI, and John Schulman, another co-founder, who joined rival AI firm Anthropic in August. OpenAI president Greg Brockman is also currently on extended leave.

Murati joined OpenAI in 2018 after stints at Tesla and Ultraleap (formerly Leap Motion). She was instrumental in OpenAI’s rise to prominence, particularly with the public release of ChatGPT in 2022, which sparked an AI race among tech giants.

Last November, during a brief leadership crisis that saw CEO Sam Altman ousted and then reinstated, Murati was briefly elevated to interim CEO. She, along with over 500 OpenAI employees, threatened to resign if Altman was not reinstated, reflecting her deep influence within the company.

Recently, Murati led advancements in AI, including the release of GPT-4o, which introduced human-like conversations to ChatGPT, and OpenAI o1, an AI model designed to solve complex problems with enhanced reasoning abilities.

In her farewell note, Murati expressed her intent to take time for personal exploration, while pledging to assist with the leadership transition. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman responded with gratitude, highlighting her significant contributions and support during challenging times. Altman also noted that more details regarding the leadership transition would be shared soon.