The "female general" behind ChatGPT leaves OpenAI

"I'm leaving because I want to create time and space to explore myself," Mira Murati, OpenAI's CTO and the "quiet woman" behind the company's success, wrote on X. "I'm now focused on ensuring a smooth transition and maintaining the momentum we've built."

According toThe VergeMurati is considered one of the most important figures at OpenAI. Her decision comes nearly a year after the “CEO coup,” when the board attempted to oust CEO Sam Altman and install Murati as the company’s interim leader.

The company's Dev Day conference is scheduled to be held in San Francisco next week. Last year, a leadership shakeup came shortly after the first Dev Day.

During his six years at OpenAI, Murati was responsible for managing the ChatGPT chatbot as well as the Dall-E text-to-image engine.

“It’s hard to put into words how much Mira has meant to OpenAI, our mission, and everyone,” Sam Altman posted on X following Murati’s announcement. “I’m incredibly grateful for what she’s helped us build and achieve, but most of all for her support and love during a difficult time. I look forward to what she does next.”

Murati, born in 1988 in San Francisco, studied mechanical engineering at Dartmouth College and was retained as a teaching assistant before joining the renowned research firm Goldman Sachs. In 2012, she joined the aerospace company Zodiac Aerospace.

A year later, Murati joined Tesla as a senior product manager and became one of the people responsible for the design and development of several models, such as the Model X. She also participated in several projects at the aerospace company SpaceX before joining the startup Leap Motion in 2016.

From June 2018 to December 2020, Mira Murati served as Vice President of AI Applications and Partnerships at OpenAI. She then became responsible for the company's entire product development and has served as CTO since May 2022.

Nearly a year after the "failed firing", a series of key OpenAI personnel continue to quit. According toTechCrunch, now only three co-founders are working at OpenAI, partly showing the crisis at the top of the world's most famous AI startup.