Ilya Sutskever, co-founder and chief scientific officer of OpenAI, has officially left the company after nearly a decade with him.
The announcement of Sutskever's departure came a day after OpenAI introduced GPT-4o with capabilities considered "nearly human-equivalent". However, it is unclear what the chief architect's role is for this super AI.
“After almost a decade, I have made the decision that I will leave OpenAI,” Ilya Sutskever wrote on X Tuesday afternoon. “I'm very excited about what's going to happen to me, a very meaningful project. I will share more details when appropriate."
OpenAI said Jakub Pachocki, the company's Research Director, will take over Sutskever's position.
The specific reason for Mr. Sutskever's departure was not disclosed, but many speculate that it was related to internal conflicts within the company.
On November 17 last year, Ilya Sutskever was said to have played a central role in the dismissal of CEO Altman, but this effort was unsuccessful and led to tensions in the relationship between the two.
This departure marks a big loss for OpenAI, after another founding member, Andrej Karpathy, also left earlier this year.
Even so, CEO Altman still praised Sutskever: “This is very sad for me; Ilya was one of the greatest minds of our generation, a guiding light in our field, and a dear friend.”
Currently, Mr. Sutskever has not yet revealed his next project. However, many people believe that he will continue to pursue research in the field of AI and may contribute to the development of new AI technologies that are safe and beneficial to humanity.
