AI: OpenAI, Hard Stop and Start again

...nothing seemingly changed, and yet...

What a sudden, sharp stop for OpenAI and the AI industry for almost a week.

After a whirlwind five days, we all seem to be back in the same place. Back on the road, ramping up again.

Yes we’ve all traveled to a far different place in the AI world since last friday afternoon. Yes, Sam Altman is again the CEO of OpenAI, and yes, the Black Swan battle with the Board highlighted the tight commercial bonds between Sam Altman and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. Yes, a majority of the 800 OpenAI employees rallied together behind Sam Altman and Greg Brockman. Yes, even the Thrive VC led secondary financing at an $86 billion plus valuation seems to be back on track. And yes, I still think this OpenAI drama was but a blip in the early days of the secular AI Tech Wave ahead of us.

And yet, the reverberations from the OpenAI feel like they could have unintended consequences for a number of near and long-term drivers for the industry. At the very least, it’s highlighted ongoing white hot debate on AI development ‘Speed vs. Safety’ issues on the minds of regulators, the media, and society at large. Most mainstream users have yet to truly experience LLM AI products and services at scale and polls already indicate their heightened fears of the relatively unknown benefits of AI.

Entrepreneurs, founders, and investors with billions at stake, have now all got to look at the Foundation LLM AI landscape under the light of the divisions that drove the schism between the non-profit OpenAI board, and the senior team that was racing ahead to commercialize LLM AI with Microsoft and others. Every founder and VC is taking a fresh look at their Boards lest they have similar issues coming up as possible blind spots.

As are millions of Developers, who will be looking at OpenAI’s commercial AI plans with fresh eyes relative to competing AI products and services, be they open or closed, big or small, narrow or general AI applications. Same goes for countless business customers large and small, who now have to weigh a different measure of stability at OpenAI than might have been in their calculus just last week.

One has to look at the landscape with fresh eyes after every big unexpected event, especially at the company that kicked off the current AI gold rush with ChatGPT now just a year ago. OpenAI still has a lot of work to do to put their affairs back together again, especially given the forces of ‘effective altruism’ (aka EA) at OpenAI and other tech/AI companies currently driving the ‘speed vs safety’ debates.

The aftermath of this week’s events are not fully yet in the rear view mirror. Yes, I still think the road ahead is full of promise. But just after any hard stop due to an obstacle in the road, it takes a bit of time before things speed up again.

Thankfully, for now it may be more or less back to normal for OpenAI. And just in time for the Thanksgiving break. Stay tuned.

(NOTE: The discussions here are for information purposes only, and not meant as investment advice at any time. Thanks for joining us here)