OpenAI investors push for Sam Altman’s return as CEO: Report

November 19, 2023 Coin Telegraph

According to sources familiar with the matter, key investors at OpenAI disagreed with the board's decision to terminate CEO Sam Altman and are advocating for his reinstatement.

The board of directors at OpenAI is reportedly receiving criticism from investors over the decision to terminate its CEO Sam Altman.

According to a November 19 Bloomberg report, citing people familiar with the matter, several investors of OpenAI – the artificial intelligence (AI) company behind chatGPT – are reportedly in contact with its largest shareholder, Microsoft, in an effort to reinstate Altman as CEO.

On November 17, OpenAI announced the removal of Altman as CEO, with its chief technology officer Mira Murati stepping into the CEO position.

In a blog post, the board claimed that Altman's communication lacked clarity and honesty, making it challenging to obtain a comprehensive understanding of the operations.

Thrive Capital, anticipated to spearhead a tender offer for employee shares, has reportedly not sent the funds yet, and Altman's departure is poised to impact its course of action.

Reportedly, Thrive wants the board to re-engage both Altman and Greg Brockman, its president, who departed on Friday shortly after Altman was removed from the company.

Sam and I are shocked and saddened by what the board did today.

Let us first say thank you to all the incredible people who we have worked with at OpenAI, our customers, our investors, and all of those who have been reaching out.

We too are still trying to figure out exactly…
— Greg Brockman (@gdb) November 18, 2023

Brockman announced his departure after it was revealed that Altman had been dropped by the board.

“Based on today's news, I quit,” Brockman declared in a post on X.

Following the news, three OpenAI senior researchers, including Jakub Pachocki, director of research, Aleksander Madry, head of preparedness, and Szymon Sidor, senior researcher, also departed.

Meanwhile, reports indicate that Altman is willing to return to the company, contingent upon the current board stepping down by the end of the weekend.

Furthermore, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella reportedly expressed his support for any decision Altman makes, given that the board's decision was also a surprise to him.

However, recent reports since Altman's dismissal on Friday state that he is developing a new AI venture set to launch, as per familiar sources. Furthermore, there were reports indicating that Brockman would be joining Altman in this venture.

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‘Every customer solution’ will be integrated with AI: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella

October 21, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Aritifical Intelligence

In an annual letter, Satya Nadella outlined Microsoft's plans for AI, which includes integrating the AI and its Copilot across the firm’s “most used products.”

Microsoft looks set to go all-in on artificial intelligence, with CEO and chairman Satya Nadella outlining intentions to integrate AI with essentially all its customer solutions and every layer of tech stacks.

The firm has made several significant AI plays in 2023, with its partnership with OpenAI and its web browser-integrated AI Copilot being key examples of this.

Here's my annual letter to shareholders, a look at how we're reimagining every layer of our tech stack in this new age of AI—and our growing opportunity ahead. https://t.co/lMZjxhDcMj
— Satya Nadella (@satyanadella) October 19, 2023

In an annual letter shared via LinkedIn on Oct. 19 — a Microsoft-owned platform that recently rolled out an AI assistant — Nadella emphasized that the “next generation of AI will reshape every software category and every business, including our own.”

“Every customer solution area and every layer of our tech stack will be reimagined for the AI era. And that’s exactly what we’ve already begun to do.”

Speaking on the firm's AI Copilot, Nadella outlined that Microsoft is “building Copilot into all our most used products and experiences,” as well as creating a standalone app.

“Just like you boot up an OS to access applications or use a browser to visit websites today, our belief is that you will invoke a Copilot to do all those activities and more: to shop, to code, to analyze, to learn, to create,” he wrote.

*Intro to the Microsoft CEO's letter. Source: LinkedIn*

In the letter, the Microsoft CEO highlighted two key breakthroughs that he thinks will be pivotal in “this new era of AI.”

Firstly, he highlighted natural language processing, a branch of AI focused on helping computers understand text and speech similarly to human beings.

“We believe we have now arrived at the next big step forward—natural language—and will quickly go beyond, to see, hear, interpret, and make sense of our intent and the world around us,” he wrote.

Secondly, he pointed to the “ emergence of a powerful new reasoning engine,” (a.k.a generative AI) and its capabilities for aspects like answering questions, solving problems and image recognition.

“This generation of AI helps us interact with data in powerful new ways—from completing or summarizing text, to detecting anomalies and recognizing images—to help us identify patterns and surface insights faster than ever.”

To date, Microsoft has already integrated its AI Copilot into services such as Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365 and GitHub. For its gaming unit however, Nadella didn’t specifically outline the firm’s AI plans in that area.

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Microsoft’s massive metaverse move: Buying Activision for $69B

January 19, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Microsoft’s massive metaverse move: Buying Activision for B

Activision Blizzard

Following the Activision Blizzard acquisition announcement, Microsoft CEO and chairman Satya Nadella stated that gaming “will play a key role in the development of metaverse platforms.”

Microsoft is acquiring gaming giant Activision Blizzard for $69 billion as part of a move to ramp up its gaming and metaverse plans.

Activision Blizzard is home to a long list of iconic gaming franchises such as Call of Duty, Overwatch, Candy Crush, World of Warcraft and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. Following the deal, its games are set to be added to Microsoft Xbox’s Game Pass service, which has 25 million subscribers.

According to a Tuesday announcement from Microsoft, the firm will acquire Activision Blizzard for $95.00 per share at a valuation of $68.7 billion. The deal is set to close in the 2023 fiscal year will see Microsoft become the third-largest gaming company in terms of revenue behind Riot Games owner Tencent and PlayStation developer Sony.

Together with @ATVI_AB, we will usher in a new era of gaming that puts players and creators first and makes gaming safe, inclusive, and accessible to all. https://t.co/fF2Ig3gSfx
— Satya Nadella (@satyanadella) January 18, 2022

Microsoft outlined that the acquisition will support the growth of its services across mobile, PC, console and cloud gaming and also notably stated that it will “provide building blocks for the Metaverse.” Microsoft CEO and chairman Satya Nadella said:

“Gaming is the most dynamic and exciting category in entertainment across all platforms today and will play a key role in the development of metaverse platforms.”

As part of the acquisition, Microsoft stated that Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick will remain at the helm until the deal closes, with the reins then being handed over to Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer.

Spencer welcomed the deal via an Xbox blog post and emphasized the company is working to make cloud gaming accessible on as many devices as possible. He didn’t mention the metaverse or nonfungible tokens (NFT), however — sectors that have seen a backlash from some sections of the gaming community.

“The fantastic franchises across Activision Blizzard will also accelerate our plans for Cloud Gaming, allowing more people in more places around the world to participate in the Xbox community using phones, tablets, laptops and other devices you already own,” Spencer wrote.

Some sentiments I’ve heard from Activision Blizzard employees today:
- Optimism about management changes and the positive culture at several Xbox-owned studios
- Fury toward Microsoft for giving Bobby Kotick a big payday and soft exit
- Determination to keep organizing
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) January 18, 2022

In November, Nadella first unveiled Microsoft’s metaverse plans via an upgrade to its “Teams” service and a product called “Dynamics 365 Connected Spaces.” The “Mesh” upgrade for Teams is set to introduce personalized digital avatars and immersive spaces to meet in the metaverse later this year.

Nadella also stated at the time that people can “absolutely expect” to see Microsoft integrate metaverse features with the Xbox gaming consoles but didn’t divulge any concrete plans or specific details.

It is unclear whether Microsoft’s metaverse play for Xbox will include the introduction of NFTs, with Spencer stating in November that he felt the experimentation happening in NFTs was more “exploitative than about entertainment.”

Spencer noted that if the Xbox Store were to support NFTs, the company would actively weed out any nefarious behavior or content.

Microsoft acquires another massive gaming company, the monopoly continues to grow as Sony scrambles to make their next power play, the console war is at an all time climax

Meanwhile, at Nintendo: pic.twitter.com/adJlrMQZLY
— Colin (@IntroSpecktive) January 18, 2022

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that 100 employees from Microsoft’s augmented reality team have left the company over the past year to join metaverse competitor Meta (Facebook).

Satya Nadella

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