BREAKING: Sam Altman returns to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board?

Sam Altman could return to OpenAI as CEO after the company initiated talks to potentially reinstate the former CEO of the artificial intelligence (AI) research lab.

OpenAI said, "We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam Altman to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board of Bret Taylor (Chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D'Angelo. We are collaborating to figure out the details. Thank you so much for your patience through this."

Former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor will serve as a director on a new board.

This development comes after Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in an interview to CNBC that he’d be open to Altman returning to OpenAI, rather than joining his company. Altman and OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman were set to join Microsoft to lead a new advanced AI research team.

Over 500 OpenAI employees, including co-founder Ilya Sutskever, on November 20 signed a letter demanding the resignation of the remaining board members. They indicated that they would follow Altman to his new AI research venture at Microsoft if their demands were not met.

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