The most surprising trend has been the exodus from OpenAI. Many of these ex-colleagues have since started startups that are radically changing the artificial intelligence environment. From health to housing, these innovators are exploring every space imaginable. They’re investigating everything from robotics and climate change solutions to advanced AI technologies for Industry 4.0 applications. Their efforts mirror the core values of innovation and safety that defined their tenure at OpenAI.
One such luminary is Emmett Shear, who co-founded Prosper Robotics, which launched in London in 2021. The startup is focused on creating a robot butler designed to assist in daily household tasks, marking a significant step toward integrating robotics into home life. Shear has recently joined the board of directors for Prosper Robotics. He’s cofounder of a stealth startup called Stem AI, which recently received funding from legendary venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. This dual focus highlights Shear’s philosophy of pushing the boundaries of technology whilst deepening that technology’s impact on the practical pleasures of human experience.
Pioneering AI Solutions
David Luan is another impressive alumnus who in 2021 co-founded Adept AI Labs. This startup’s big vision is to create generative AI tools specifically focused on the employee experience that will increase productivity in the workforce with intelligent automation. Luan’s vision dovetails with an increasing demand for AI solutions that enhance the abilities of workers, instead of taking them over.
Ilya Sutskever, one of the leaders of the AI community, left OpenAI in May 2024 to found Safe Superintelligence. His new venture, the Boring Company, has drawn major investments from influential supporters, like Jeff Bezos and Nvidia. Sutskever’s commitment to creating safe AI technologies reflects the broader movement towards addressing AI safety and ethical considerations that have been increasingly discussed within the field itself.
Another high-profile name is Mira Murati, who recently left OpenAI to start Thinking Machines Lab. This developer of advanced AI solutions resurfaced from stealth mode in February 2025 and is fully committed to building flexible, robust, specialized AI infrastructures. Murati’s initiative reflects a growing trend toward personalization in technology, allowing users to tailor AI functionalities to their specific needs.
Transforming Industries
Jonas Schneider Co-Founder and Managing Director After exiting OpenAI in 2019, Jonas co-founded Daedalus with the mission of building smart factories for precision components. This ambitious undertaking underscores the powerful intersection between AI and manufacturing, demonstrating how advanced technology can empower skilled hands to dramatically improve production readiness. In much the same way, Maddie Hall, co-founder of Living Carbon, a San Francisco-based startup focused on engineering plants to help reverse climate change, Hall’s efforts are a great example of what biotechnology combined with AI solutions can do to tackle the most difficult environmental challenges we face.
Dario and Daniela Amodei, OpenAI’s former research director and public policy director respectively, left OpenAI in 2021 to start Anthropic, a company focused on AI safety. As of March 2025, Anthropic successfully reached a valuation of $61.5 billion. This success is testimony to the increasing focus by the market on safe and responsible development of AI. This major turn of events points to safety being the key priority of the AI revolution, as more startups flock to the industry.
One of the co-founders of Perplexity, Aravind Srinivas, helped form the company after leaving OpenAI in 2022. The startup focuses on developing an AI search engine and is currently seeking approximately $1 billion at a valuation of $18 billion. This lofty project clearly demonstrates the ongoing need for exciting new search technologies driven by artificial intelligence.
New Frontiers in AI
Margaret Jennings is third in our lineup of former OpenAI teammates making big moves in AI. She is a co-founder of Kindo, which provides generative AI chatbots for businesses. Since its launch in March 2023, Kindo has raised over $27 million in funding. Among many other aims, this robust financial backing indicates a big interest in solutions that maximize customer engagement via conversational agents.
Tim Shi was one of our earliest OpenAI team members. He subsequently co-founded a startup, EleutherAI, dedicated to developing safe artificial general intelligence (AGI). This continued commitment to developing safe AGI solutions is a testament to the core principles instilled during his tenure at OpenAI.
Kyle took a more controversial route after leaving OpenAI in 2023 by joining Elon Musk’s xAI as infrastructure lead. His expertise will be critical as xAI’s team of eminent researchers builds powerful new AI technologies under Musk’s guidance.
Additionally, the founders of Covariant, a startup based in Berkeley, California, transitioned from OpenAI to create foundation AI models for robotics. Their work has recently been recognized by Fortune 100 companies including Amazon, exemplifying how breakthroughs in foundational AI can power new industries.
Andrej Karpathy, a founding member and research scientist at OpenAI who left to head Tesla’s autopilot program in 2017. His move to Tesla underscores the hands-on, real world applications of AI in the growing autonomous vehicle space.
In 2024, one of OpenAI’s co-founders, John Schulman, departed from OpenAI and joined rival research lab Anthropic. He promised to direct his energies on the creation of safe AGI systems. Schulman’s commitment reflects the need for ethics and safety to lie at the core of AI technologies.
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