OpenAI’s former Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati announced her new venture, Thinking Machines Lab, a San Francisco-based artificial intelligence startup focused on enhancing human-AI collaboration. The company said it aims to make AI systems more accessible, understandable, and customizable and has already attracted a team of approximately 30 top researchers and engineers — many recruited from other tech leaders, including OpenAI, Meta, and Mistral.
John Schulman, an OpenAI co-founder and a key figure behind the development of ChatGPT, will serve as Thinking Machines Lab’s chief scientist, while former OpenAI VP of Research Barret Zoph is the new Chief Technology Officer. Other significant additions include OpenAI alums Jonathan Lachman and Alexander Kirillov, as well as experts from Google, Meta, Mistral, and Character AI, reflecting a diverse pool of talent dedicated to advancing AI technology.
Public benefit corporation: AI for the common good?
Murati structured Thinking Machines Lab as a public benefit corporation to highlight its commitment to developing advanced AI that is both accessible and beneficial to the public. The company’s mission centers on three primary objectives: helping people adapt AI systems to meet specific needs, laying the foundation for more capable AI systems, and fostering open science to enhance our collective understanding of AI and related technologies.
Expressing a strong commitment to transparency, Murati said the company plans to regularly publish technical notes, papers, and share code to bridge the gap between rapid AI advancements and public understanding and help ensure that AI development progresses in a manner aligned with human values and safety.
OpenAI exodus feeds Thinking Machines Lab… and controversy
Murati briefly served as OpenAI’s interim CEO during a management dispute but left the company in September 2024. Her exit was part of a broader wave of company departures that has fragmented the AI landscape and fostered speculation about the future of competition. Thinking Machines Lab’s mission has also sparked interest as a controversy about OpenAI’s own mission is making news.
OpenAI cofounder Elon Musk claims the organization has strayed from its original mission of developing AI for the benefit of humanity and criticized it for transitioning from a nonprofit research lab into a for-profit entity with close ties to Microsoft, arguing that it contradicts OpenAI’s original commitment to open research and public benefit. In response, CEO Sam Altman defended the shift and countered that Musk himself had pushed for more control and financial gains when he was involved, making the conflict a high-profile clash over the future of artificial intelligence governance and corporate ethics.
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