Following the abrupt departure of OpenAI’s CTO, Mira Murati, CEO Sam Altman is reportedly poised to receive equity in the company for the first time as OpenAI moves away from its longstanding nonprofit structure.
Reuters, citing people familiar with the matter, reports that OpenAI plans to restructure into a for-profit benefit corporation — similar to rivals such as Anthropic and Elon Musk’s xAI. The nonprofit OpenAI board, which currently oversees OpenAI’s for-profit operations, will relinquish control but retain a minority stake in the new for-profit OpenAI entity.
The transition is intended to make OpenAI more attractive to outside investors, who’ve chafed at the company’s current cap on returns. But it’s likely to raise concerns from the AI safety community about whether OpenAI can hold itself accountable in its pursuit of superintelligent AI.
Per Reuters, much of the restructuring plan’s details — and timeline — are still being hashed out.