OpenAI's fixer rebuilt the company in eight months — then walked away

FIDJI SIMO spent eight months at OpenAI. In that time, she killed the company's splashiest product, restructured its org chart, pushed through its first media acquisition, and consolidated a sprawl of chatbots and coding tools into a single "super app" — then, on Friday, announced she was taking medical leave and might not return for weeks. The memo in which she disclosed her own departure also contained the departures of two other senior executives. It was, by any measure, a remarkably productive farewell.

The management shakeup, disclosed in a staff memo viewed by multiple outlets, is the most significant since the November 2023 board crisis that briefly ousted Sam Altman. Chief operating officer Brad Lightcap, one of Altman's longest-serving lieutenants, is moving to a nebulously titled "special projects" role focused on private-equity joint ventures; according to Axios, the lead venture carries a reported pre-money valuation of $10 billion. Chief marketing officer Kate Rouch is stepping down to focus on her recovery from late-stage breast cancer. Denise Dresser, the former Slack chief executive who joined OpenAI as chief revenue officer, will absorb most of Lightcap's responsibilities. Greg Brockman, the company's president and co-founder, will oversee product. The changes leave OpenAI — now valued at $852 billion and generating $2 billion a month in revenue — governed by a four-person leadership committee, with Simo and Altman positioned at varying distances from the day-to-day.