Two co-founders of Thinking Machines Lab, an AI startup founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, are leaving the company and returning to OpenAI, TechCrunch reported on Jan. 15 local time.
Murati announced on social media that co-founder and CTO Barrett Zoph is leaving and said Sumit Chintala has been appointed the new CTO.
She did not mention the departure of another co-founder, Luke Metz. OpenAI applications CEO Fidji Simo said 58 minutes later that Barrett Zoph, Luke Metz and Sam Schoenholz are returning to OpenAI, suggesting the departures were planned.
Metz worked as technical staff at OpenAI, and Zoph has served as OpenAI's vice president of research and a Google research scientist. Murati left OpenAI in September 2024 to found Thinking Machines Lab and raised $2 billion in seed funding on July last year. But TechCrunch said signs of internal instability are being detected as co-founders depart just a year after the company's launch.
Chigyu Hwang
delight@d-today.co.kr