{"id":2373,"date":"2026-06-19T05:11:07","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T05:11:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/silvybrand.com\/?p=2373"},"modified":"2026-06-19T05:11:07","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T05:11:07","slug":"barret-zoph-openai-thinking-machines-lab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/silvybrand.com\/?p=2373","title":{"rendered":"Barret Zoph is out at OpenAI again after just five months"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Five months after returning to OpenAI, Barret Zoph \u2014 the company\u2019s head of enterprise AI sales \u2014 has departed, The Verge<\/em> has learned.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Zoph returned to OpenAI in mid-January after a stint as co-founder and CTO of Thinking Machines Lab, the competing AI company founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati. Shortly after Zoph returned to OpenAI, the company said he would lead its push into enterprise \u2014 a significant role at OpenAI, since in recent months it had vowed to stop chasing<\/a> so-called \u201cside quests\u201d and focus on key revenue drivers like enterprise and coding ahead of its planned IPO.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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OpenAI confirmed to The Verge<\/em> that Zoph will be departing. He posted a goodbye message in the company\u2019s Slack channels. Zoph did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Zoph originally left OpenAI in the fall of 2024 for Murati\u2019s Thinking Machines Lab, but departed the role abruptly in January 2026 after reports of alleged misconduct<\/a> involving an undisclosed relationship with a colleague. Murati posted<\/a> on X in January that Thinking Machines Lab had \u201cparted ways\u201d with Zoph and that he would be replaced as CTO.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Thinking Machines Lab has its own tensions with OpenAI. Murati briefly took over as CEO from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman during his November 2023 ouster, and during the recent OpenAI trial, Murati testified<\/a> that she couldn\u2019t trust everything Altman said. In September 2024, when Murati left OpenAI to start Thinking Machines Lab, a group of OpenAI employees followed shortly after. But three of them \u2014 including Zoph \u2014 all returned to OpenAI together this past January. Fidji Simo, OpenAI\u2019s CEO of Applications, wrote<\/a> on X at the time that she was \u201cexcited to welcome Barret Zoph, Luke Metz, and Sam Schoenholz back\u201d and that the decision had \u201cbeen in the works for several weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Five months after returning to OpenAI, Barret Zoph \u2014 the company\u2019s head of enterprise AI sales \u2014 has departed, The Verge has learned. Zoph returned to OpenAI in mid-January after a stint as co-founder and CTO of Thinking Machines Lab, the competing AI company founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati. Shortly after Zoph returned […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1724,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[31,78,126],"class_list":["post-2373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-gadgets","tag-ai","tag-openai","tag-report"],"yoast_head":"\nBarret Zoph is out at OpenAI again after just five months - Silvybrand Lifestyle Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"He rejoined the company in January after a stint as co-founder of Mira Murati\u2019s competitor, Thinking Machines Lab.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/silvybrand.com\/?p=2373\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Barret Zoph is out at OpenAI again after just five months - 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