Sam Altman

Sam Altman is co-founder and chief executive of OpenAI, the San Francisco-based artificial intelligence company whose release of ChatGPT in late 2022 triggered the generative AI boom that has reshaped the technology industry, capital markets and public policy. Under his leadership OpenAI has grown from a research non-profit into one of the most valuable private companies in the world, with a business built on large language models sold via API, subscription products and enterprise partnerships.

Altman dropped out of Stanford University to co-found the location-based social network Loopt, before joining startup accelerator Y Combinator, where he served as president from 2014 to 2019 and backed hundreds of early-stage companies. He co-founded OpenAI in 2015 with Elon Musk and others as a non-profit research lab dedicated to ensuring artificial general intelligence benefits humanity, later restructuring it around a capped-profit arm to raise the capital needed for large-scale model training.

His tenure has not been without turbulence. In November 2023, OpenAI's non-profit board abruptly fired Altman, citing a breakdown in communication; the move triggered a staff revolt, with nearly all employees threatening to resign, and Altman was reinstated within days alongside a reconstituted board. The episode cemented his centrality to the company and to the wider AI industry's trajectory.

Altman has become one of the most prominent public voices on AI policy, testifying before the US Congress, meeting heads of state, and championing both the transformative potential and the safety risks of advanced AI. He has pursued vast infrastructure ambitions, including the multi-billion-dollar Stargate data centre initiative with partners such as Oracle and SoftBank, and has pushed OpenAI deeper into consumer hardware, enterprise tools and agentic AI products.

Beyond OpenAI, Altman has invested in nuclear fusion (Helion Energy), life extension research, and Worldcoin (now World), a biometric identity and cryptocurrency project co-founded to address AI-driven authentication challenges. His combination of technical ambition, fundraising prowess and political engagement has made him one of the defining figures of the current AI era.