5 Things To Know About Mira Murati, the Interim CEO Of OpenAI Murati has been called the brilliant mind behind the development of ChatGPT and DALL-E
By S Shanthi
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Mira Murati has been appointed interim CEO of OpenAI, following the board's decision on Friday to fire Sam Altman, the co-founder and CEO of ChatGPT. In a statement OpenAI said that Altman was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities. "The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI," it said.
The company said that Murati had a "unique skill set" and would provide "a seamless transition while it conducts a formal search for a permanent CEO." She has been called the brilliant mind behind the development of ChatGPT and DALL-E, OpenAI's pathbreaking products.
Here are five things to know about the new interim CEO of OpenAI:
A mechanical engineer by training
34-year-old Mira Murati was born in Albania and raised in Canada. Murati is a mechanical engineer by training and during her time at Ivy League Dartmouth College, she showcased her mechanical engineering skills by building a hybrid race car. She is also trilingual, and can speak Italian, Albanian, and English.
She had a Tesla stint before OpenAI
She started her professional journey as an intern at Goldman Sachs and then at Zodiac Aerospace and then went on to work at Tesla as a senior product manager before joining OpenAI. At Tesla, she played a key role in the development of the Model X car. Murati said that working at Tesla exposed her to artificial intelligence (AI) and motivated her to look for a job in that field.
Her love for AI kept her going
"I thought that fundamentally if you're building intelligence, it's such a core unit in the universe that it affects everything. What else is there to do more inspiring than elevate and increase collective intelligence of humanity?" she said in August at an event hosted by Andreessen Horowitz, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm. Murati was also associated with a startup, Leap Motion, that developed a computing system to track hand and finger motions. During this time, she focused on implementing applications of AI in practical, real-world scenarios. According to news reports, she joined the startup in 2016 as VP of product and engineering.
"It's very important to bring the public along, bring these technologies in the public consciousness, but in a way that's responsible and safe," Murati told Trevor Noah, "The Daily Show" host last year.
Her OpenAI journey started in 2018
Murati joined OpenAI in 2018 as the Vice President of AI and partnerships. She was also part of the leadership team and was promoted to the post of Senior Vice President of research, product and partnerships in 2020. In 2022, she took over as OpenAI's Chief Technology Officer. She played a key role in developing ChatGPT, Dall-E and some of the other advanced chatbots. Since last year, Murati had reportedly functioning as the company's head of operations and made sure that its engineers developed versions of ChatGPT on schedule.
"We are now at a crucial juncture where our tools are being widely adopted, developers are actively building on our platforms, and policymakers are deliberating on the best ways to regulate these systems," Murati wrote in a memo.
She has often been praised by tech leaders
She has often been praised by many for her passion and technical knowledge. "She has a demonstrated ability to assemble teams with technical expertise, commercial acumen and a deep appreciation for the importance of mission," Satya Nadella, Microsoft's CEO, said in a piece about her for Time magazine. "As a result, Mira has helped build some of the most exciting AI technologies we've ever seen," he added.
