<div><b><span style="font-size: 1rem;">The ousted leader of ChatGPT-maker OpenAI is returning to the company that fired him late last week, the latest in a saga that has shocked the artificial intelligence industry.</span><br></b></div><div><br></div><div>San Francisco-based OpenAI said in a statement late Tuesday: “We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam Altman to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board" made of former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor, former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and Quora CEO Adam D’Angelo.</div><div><br></div><div>OpenAI’s previous board of directors, which included D'Angelo, had refused to give specific reasons for why it fired Altman on Friday, leading to a weekend of internal conflict at the company and growing outside pressure from the startup's investors.</div><div><br></div><div>Microsoft, which has invested billions of dollars in OpenAI and has rights to its technology, quickly moved to hire Altman on Monday, as well as another co-founder and former president, Greg Brockman, who had quit in protest after Altman's removal. That emboldened a threatened exodus of nearly all of the startup's 770 employees who signed a letter calling for the board's resignation and Altman's return.</div><div><br></div><div>Microsoft Chief Technology Officer Kevin Scott put out a call to the startup’s employees Tuesday on X, formerly Twitter: “Know that if needed, you have a role at Microsoft that matches your compensation and advances our collective mission.”</div><div><br></div><div>Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also made clear in a series of interviews Monday that he was still open to the possibility of Altman returning to OpenAI, so long as the startup's governance and board problems are solved.</div><div><br></div><div>“We are encouraged by the changes to the OpenAI board,” Nadella posted on X late Tuesday. “We believe this is a first essential step on a path to more stable, well-informed, and effective governance.”</div><div><br></div><div>In his own post, Altman said that “with the new board and (with) Satya's support, I'm looking forward to returning to OpenAI, and building on our strong partnership with (Microsoft)."</div><div><br></div><div>Co-founded by Altman as a nonprofit with a mission to safely build so-called artificial general intelligence that outperforms humans and benefits humanity, OpenAI later became a for-profit business but one still run by its nonprofit board of directors. It's not clear yet if the board's structure will change with its newly appointed members.</div><div><br></div><div>Nadella said Brockman, who was OpenAI's board chairman until Altman's firing, will also have a key role to play in ensuring OpenAI “continues to thrive and build on its mission.”</div><div><br></div><div>Hours earlier, Brockman returned to social media as if it were business as usual, touting a feature called ChatGPT Voice that was rolling out for free to everyone who uses the chatbot.</div><div><br></div><div>“Give it a try — totally changes the ChatGPT experience,” Brockman wrote, flagging a post from OpenAI's main X account that featured a demonstration of the technology playfully winking at recent turmoil.</div><div><br></div><div>“It’s been a long night for the team and we’re hungry. How many 16-inch pizzas should I order for 778 people,” the person asks, using the number of people who work at OpenAI. ChatGPT's synthetic voice responded by recommending around 195 pizzas, ensuring everyone gets three slices.</div><div><br></div><div>As for OpenAI's short-lived interim CEO Emmett Shear, the second interim CEO in the days since Altman's ouster, he posted on X that he was “deeply pleased by this result, after (tilde)72 very intense hours of work.”</div><div><br></div><div>“Coming into OpenAI, I wasn't sure what the right path would be,” Shear wrote. “This was the pathway that maximized safety alongside doing right by all stakeholders involved. I'm glad to have been a part of the solution.” - AP&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>