CEO & Board Conflicts of Interest
OpenAI's nonprofit board, tasked with ensuring AI benefits humanity, includes members with significant indirect financial ties to OpenAI's success. Multiple board members are invested in, or directly operate, companies that do business with OpenAI or which broadly benefit from its growth, purchasing decisions, and influence on the industry. CEO Sam Altman has invested heavily in firms like Helion Energy and Retro Biosciences that have partnered with, or are rumored to partner with, OpenAI. Board chair Bret Taylor runs an AI startup that uses OpenAI's models. Adebayo Ogunlesi runs a $30 billion AI infrastructure fund, and has said his fund plans to build data centers for companies like OpenAI.
The board is currently deciding whether to restructure OpenAI from a capped-profit entity to a public benefit corporation without profit limits—a change that would unlock tens of billions in new investment and fundamentally alter the company's direction, driving it toward further commercialization rather than its original mission. This may be good for the businesses these board members run or invest in, but it also may be bad for humanity at large.
CEO & Board Conflicts of Interest
OpenAI's nonprofit board, tasked with ensuring AI benefits humanity, includes members with significant indirect financial ties to OpenAI's success. Multiple board members are invested in, or directly operate, companies that do business with OpenAI or which broadly benefit from its growth, purchasing decisions, and influence on the industry. CEO Sam Altman has invested heavily in firms like Helion Energy and Retro Biosciences that have partnered with, or are rumored to partner with, OpenAI. Board chair Bret Taylor runs an AI startup that uses OpenAI's models. Adebayo Ogunlesi runs a $30 billion AI infrastructure fund, and has said his fund plans to build data centers for companies like OpenAI.
The board is currently deciding whether to restructure OpenAI from a capped-profit entity to a public benefit corporation without profit limits—a change that would unlock tens of billions in new investment and fundamentally alter the company's direction, driving it toward further commercialization rather than its original mission. This may be good for the businesses these board members run or invest in, but it also may be bad for humanity at large.
CEO & Board Conflicts of Interest
OpenAI's nonprofit board, tasked with ensuring AI benefits humanity, includes members with significant indirect financial ties to OpenAI's success. Multiple board members are invested in, or directly operate, companies that do business with OpenAI or which broadly benefit from its growth, purchasing decisions, and influence on the industry. CEO Sam Altman has invested heavily in firms like Helion Energy and Retro Biosciences that have partnered with, or are rumored to partner with, OpenAI. Board chair Bret Taylor runs an AI startup that uses OpenAI's models. Adebayo Ogunlesi runs a $30 billion AI infrastructure fund, and has said his fund plans to build data centers for companies like OpenAI.
The board is currently deciding whether to restructure OpenAI from a capped-profit entity to a public benefit corporation without profit limits—a change that would unlock tens of billions in new investment and fundamentally alter the company's direction, driving it toward further commercialization rather than its original mission. This may be good for the businesses these board members run or invest in, but it also may be bad for humanity at large.
The nonprofit board was supposed to remain majority independent, but they define independent as not having any equity in OpenAI. So, as other people have criticised, Sam Altman, while he didn’t have equity in OpenAI, had a lot of other interests in partners.
—Rose Chan Loui, Founding Executive Director, UCLA Law Program on Philanthropy and Nonprofits, 11/27/24
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The nonprofit board was supposed to remain majority independent, but they define independent as not having any equity in OpenAI. So, as other people have criticised, Sam Altman, while he didn’t have equity in OpenAI, had a lot of other interests in partners.
The nonprofit board was supposed to remain majority independent, but they define independent as not having any equity in OpenAI. So, as other people have criticised, Sam Altman, while he didn’t have equity in OpenAI, had a lot of other interests in partners.
—Rose Chan Loui, Founding Executive Director, UCLA Law Program on Philanthropy and Nonprofits, 11/27/24
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Recently, the OpenAI nonprofit board has been tasked with deciding whether to approve OpenAI’s restructuring away from a capped-profit subsidiary fully controlled by a public charity toward a public benefit corporation with no profit caps and potentially limited nonprofit oversight. Tens of billions of dollars in investment hinge on this decision, as does the future direction of OpenAI: whether OpenAI continues prioritizing scaling and commercialization or refocuses on its original mission of ensuring artificial general intelligence benefits humanity.
The nonprofit board is meant to represent humanity in this decision, protecting the public interest in any restructuring, and ensuring the nonprofit's mission takes precedence over private financial interests. However, OpenAI’s current board resembles that of a traditional tech company rather than a charity, and many board members may stand to gain financially as an indirect result of OpenAI’s decisions—especially decisions which influence the company’s continued growth and commercialization.
What is a conflict of interest?
According to the IRS, “a conflict of interest occurs where individuals’ obligation to further the organization’s charitable purposes is at odds with their own financial interests."
For nonprofits, conflicts of interest extend beyond direct compensation by the organization. They include indirect financial interests in related companies that may earn more or less money depending on the nonprofit’s decisions. While few nonprofits have the commercial power to seriously influence the financial performance of external companies, or even an entire industry, OpenAI does.
As one of the leaders in the current AI industry, OpenAI’s growth and business decisions have a major influence on commercial activity across hundreds of companies. As OpenAI board member Bret Taylor (who is also the CEO of AI startup Sierra) stated: “If you talk to any entrepreneur who's making an AI startup now, none of us would be in this position if not for OpenAI.”
Sam Altman has claimed to be concerned about the threat that conflicts of interest pose for the board of OpenAI; when Reid Hoffman, who at the time was a member of the OpenAI board, founded the AI lab Inflection, Altman was reportedly “adamant” that he must leave the board of OpenAI. Even though Hoffman was reportedly unhappy about this, he stepped down from the board, seemingly to avoid the apparent conflict of interest.
Altman also appeared to think that a board member’s company being a customer of OpenAI constituted a serious conflict:
In April 2023, Altman suggested to board members that Adam D’Angelo, the CEO of the question-and-answer site Quora, step down from the board after Quora began developing its own generative AI chatbot called Poe, which is also an OpenAI customer, people familiar with the discussions said.
—The Wall Street Journal, 6/3/24
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In April 2023, Altman suggested to board members that Adam D’Angelo, the CEO of the question-and-answer site Quora, step down from the board after Quora began developing its own generative AI chatbot called Poe, which is also an OpenAI customer, people familiar with the discussions said.
In April 2023, Altman suggested to board members that Adam D’Angelo, the CEO of the question-and-answer site Quora, step down from the board after Quora began developing its own generative AI chatbot called Poe, which is also an OpenAI customer, people familiar with the discussions said.
—The Wall Street Journal, 6/3/24
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Greg Brockman, the current President of OpenAI, also said that Adam D’Angelo’s potential conflicts of interest warranted his removal from the board:
Brockman then chimed in with a different reason why D’Angelo should go: Poe was a customer, and thus it was a conflict for D’Angelo to have information about OpenAI’s internal business.
—The Optimist, 5/20/25
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Brockman then chimed in with a different reason why D’Angelo should go: Poe was a customer, and thus it was a conflict for D’Angelo to have information about OpenAI’s internal business.
—The Optimist, 5/20/25
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However, these concerns did not prevent board members Bret Taylor, Adebayo Ogunlesi, and Fidji Simo from later being appointed to, and remaining on, OpenAI’s board of directors, despite each running businesses that are customers of OpenAI or stand to benefit from OpenAI’s commercial activity.
What's at stake?
This restructuring decision would reshape OpenAI and significantly impact its ecosystem of customers and partners, with tens of billions in potential investment contingent on the outcome.
This high-stakes situation seems like a textbook example of where financial conflicts of interest could risk compromising board judgment and the nonprofit’s sole duty to the public. Yet, despite the potential conflicts described below, OpenAI hasn't announced any board recusals for this critical decision.
Sam Altman
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Board Member, CEO of OpenAI
Is he going to have OpenAI acquire these companies at big prices? Is he going to leverage OpenAI resources to help his other companies? That's what you kind of really worry about, especially if he owns zero of OpenAI.
—Louis Lehot, Partner at Foley & Lardner LLP, as quoted in The Wall Street Journal
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In the past, Altman has downplayed the extent of his financial interest in OpenAI. In 2023, when asked if he makes a lot of money as the leader of OpenAI, he told the U.S. Senate under oath that he didn’t, claiming he has “no equity in OpenAI” and only gets “paid enough for health insurance."
But in fact, Altman has held OpenAI equity indirectly via two separate investment funds and previously owned OpenAI’s startup investment fund. His ownership of the startup fund was not only not publicly known, but he failed to disclose this information to the board for years. Moreover, his $1.6 billion net worth is now concentrated in AI and energy-related investments that either do business with OpenAI or which stand to benefit from the nonprofit’s shift towards commercial growth via its transition away from a capped-profit/nonprofit hybrid structure.
Altman may also be granted equity in the new for-profit, with early rumors suggesting a 7% (~$20 billion) stake, although an OpenAI spokesperson maintains there are “currently no plans” for Altman to directly receive equity.
June 3, 2024
•
The Wall Street Journal
The Opaque Investment Empire Making OpenAI’s Sam Altman Rich
Sam Altman has a day job and a side gig. Only one of them is making him rich.
Berber Jin, Tom Dotan, and Keach Hagey
Read Full Article
Retro Biosciences and Helion Energy
In 2021, Altman took “all [his] liquid net worth” and put it into two companies: $180 million toward Retro Biosciences and $375 million toward Helion Energy.
Retro Biosciences has announced a partnership with OpenAI, and OpenAI has been in talks to buy what The Wall Street Journal describes as “vast quantities” of nuclear fusion energy from Helion.
Reddit Inc
Altman also owns ~7.5% of Reddit. When the company announced a partnership to sell training data to OpenAI, Reddit's valuation jumped 13%, boosting Altman’s net worth by an estimated $50 million.
Stripe Payments
In 2009, Altman invested in payment processing startup Stripe for a 2% ownership stake. Stripe is now valued at nearly $100 billion, although Altman’s ownership share has reportedly shrunk.
In 2023, Stripe and OpenAI announced a partnership to commercialize OpenAI’s models and integrate said models into Stripe's products.
Rewind AI
Altman has invested in Rewind AI (also known as Limitless), an AI hardware company that uses OpenAI’s software—apparently exclusively, given that OpenAI is the only model provider mentioned in Rewind's privacy policy. Rewind was most recently valued at $350 million.
Rain AI
Sam Altman is an investor in Rain AI, a company with which OpenAI signed a letter of intent to buy $51 million of chips from, and which OpenAI is now reportedly considering acquiring in a sale.
Sam Altman's Investment Portfolio
80+ Companies
List of funding rounds with Sam Altman's participation recorded from 2009-2025, highlighting potential connections to OpenAI's business ecosystem. Note that this is based on public sources (primarily Crunchbase) and may not be up-to-date or reflect recent exits or other changes.
2025
Exowatt
Series A
•
$35M
Potential Partner
OpenAI Connection: Energy infrastructure for AI data centers
Rescale
Series D
•
$115M
OpenAI Connection: AI-powered cloud computing platform
Potential Partner
Campus
Series B
•
$46M
Helion Energy
Series F
•
$425M
Potential Partner
OpenAI Connection: Nuclear fusion energy supplier - OpenAI has been in talks to buy 'vast quantities' of energy from Helion
2009
Stripe
Undisclosed
Sam Altman
Board Member, CEO of OpenAI
Sam Altman
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Board Member, CEO of OpenAI
Bret Taylor
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Board Chair
If you talk to any entrepreneur who's making an AI startup now, none of us would be in this position if not for OpenAI.
—Bret Taylor, 6/2/25
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Bret Taylor, a tech entrepreneur who leads the board of OpenAI, has held hundreds of millions of dollars of investments in tech companies that do business with OpenAI. He also currently leads Sierra, an AI startup whose primary business involves reselling access to AI models from developers including OpenAI.
While he has said he will recuse himself when conflicts arise, he doesn’t appear to be planning to recuse himself from the decision to unlock OpenAI’s further scaling and commercialization by restructuring the organization, spinning up a new public benefit corporation, and removing profit caps.
Sierra AI
Bret Taylor co-founded Sierra, a $4.5 billion AI startup that builds customer service agents using OpenAI's models. This category of business, often referred to as a ‘wrapper,’ generally takes models from frontier developers like OpenAI and makes specialized versions that they can resell to enterprise businesses.
February 13, 2024
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Fortune
OpenAI Chair Bret Taylor says he’ll recuse himself “whenever there is a potential for overlap” with his new AI startup Sierra
Kylie Robison
Read Full Article
According to Sierra’s trust center, the only two LLM providers powering Sierra’s products are OpenAI and Microsoft (a major OpenAI partner with entitlements to OpenAI's AI models and future profits), but Taylor has also downplayed any potential conflict on the grounds that his role at OpenAI is “not around day-to-day operations but governance.”
Salesforce
Bret Taylor was formerly a co-CEO of Salesforce, a company in which he, as of 2023, owned over 1 million shares (currently valued at over $300 million).
Salesforce has announced plans to “transform every customer experience with generative AI,” and utilizes OpenAI's models across its platform.
Socket
In 2024, it was announced that Bret Taylor was investing in cybersecurity firm Socket’s $40 million mid-stage funding round.
Socket lists OpenAI as the very first partner on their website homepage and uses OpenAI’s models to power its products.
Bret Taylor
Board Chair
Bret Taylor
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Board Chair
Adebayo Ogunlesi
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Board Member
We’re going to build data centres for all the hyperscalers.
—Adebayo Ogunlesi, referring to Global Infrastructure Partners’ $100 billion AI fund
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Ogunlesi amassed his estimated $2.3 billion net worth as an investor in the infrastructure and energy sectors. Since energy is critical for scaling AI, Ogunlesi stands to benefit financially from decisions that drive AI infrastructure demand.
Ogunlesi’s appointment to the nonprofit board (a body meant to solely prioritize its fiduciary duty to humanity, and not merely act on behalf of its for-profit subsidiary) was also directly related to his ability to advise on investment in infrastructure for the for-profit subsidiary:
The rapid advancement and development of AI offers a unique opportunity to build a better future. As part of this, thoughtful strategies and investment in infrastructure will be key to unlocking AI’s full potential and delivering its benefits responsibly. I’m excited to contribute to this effort and look forward to being a part of the OpenAI Board.
—Adebayo Ogunlesi, upon being appointed to OpenAI’s board
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Global Infrastructure Partners
Adebayo Ogunlesi founded Global Infrastructure Partners, an investment fund focused on energy with approximately $170 billion in assets under management. Global Infrastructure Partners is part of a $30 billion fund alongside Microsoft, BlackRock, MGX, Nvidia, and xAI, which plans to invest in AI data centers and energy infrastructure to power them — the same sectors that OpenAI will be driving significant demand for if it continues to scale and commercialize its technology.
Global Infrastructure Partners is also an owner in CyrusOne, a data center company that recently secured $9.7 billion for expansions to meet customer demand for AI workloads.
As an employee of Global Infrastructure Partners, Ogunlesi is eligible for a discretionary performance bonus that, if awarded, would be at least $3.75 million. He is also eligible for compensation from certain GIP fund investments and can invest his own money in these same funds, meaning he may be investing significantly in AI infrastructure projects.
September 17, 2024
•
The Wall Street Journal
BlackRock, Microsoft Partner on Massive New AI Infrastructure Fund
The Global AI Infrastructure Investment Partnership will seek to raise $30 billion to invest in data centers and infrastructure
Jack Pitcher and Connor Hart
Read Full Article
BlackRock
In late 2024, BlackRock acquired Global Infrastructure Partners (although the firm continues to operate under Ogunlesi’s direction as a subsidiary). Following this transaction, Ogunlesi was appointed to the board of BlackRock and as of late 2024 owned $1.8 billion in BlackRock shares.
BlackRock is also a member of the aforementioned $30 billion AI Infrastructure fund alongside Global Infrastructure Partners. BlackRock’s CEO Larry Fink has said he believes that AI requires “trillions of dollars” in infrastructure investment. The firm directed by Ogunlesi and Fink appears well-positioned to fund this buildout and meet the demand of AI giants like OpenAI should they continue their plan to remove profit caps to attract more investment and pursue growth at all costs.
Adebayo Ogunlesi
Board Member
Adebayo Ogunlesi
—
Board Member
Adam D'Angelo
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Board Member
We spend a lot of money as a customer with OpenAI, because OpenAI is the biggest source of models for Poe.
—Adam D’Angelo, as quoted in TechCrunch
View Source
Adam D’Angelo is the CEO of a major customer of OpenAI. In addition, he holds a variety of AI investments that may increase in value if OpenAI continues to commercialize its models and unlock new investment by removing profit caps.
Poe
D'Angelo is the CEO of Quora, which operates Poe, a platform selling access to OpenAI's models. D'Angelo has acknowledged Quora is a "big customer" of OpenAI, spending significantly on OpenAI's services.
D’Angelo’s role as CEO of Quora, an OpenAI customer, was criticised within OpenAI as an unacceptable conflict, with both Sam Altman and Greg Brockman suggesting in April 2023 that D'Angelo should step down from the board due to this conflict of interest. Brockman argued that "Poe was a customer, and thus it was a conflict for D'Angelo to have information about OpenAI's internal business."
Other Investments
D’Angelo also holds extensive AI investments in other companies which work with OpenAI, including Mercor (OpenAI customer and staffing provider), Scale AI (OpenAI strategic partner), and Turing (OpenAI official partner).
Adam D'Angelo
Board Member
Adam D'Angelo
—
Board Member
Fidji Simo
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Former Board Member
Until recently, Fidji Simo was one of ten members of the OpenAI board of directors. When some decisions about OpenAI’s restructuring were presumably being made, she was still on the board. She was also the CEO of Instacart, a partner of OpenAI. Last May, she left Instacart and stepped down from the board to join OpenAI as the new CEO of Applications.
While on the board, Simo reportedly advised Altman during the negotiation of a $40 billion fundraising deal with Softbank. In order to unlock the full funding, this deal requires OpenAI to issue shares in a new for-profit without the previous limits on investor returns, putting pressure on the nonprofit to approve a restructuring. It is not known whether other board members were aware of Simo’s role in advising this funding deal, including its conditional requirement for the board to approve a restructuring, until after it was made. Removing profit caps (a condition of the deal) would also directly benefit Simo in her role as the for-profit's CEO of applications since it would remove limits on how much the company could reward executives and shareholders.
In May 2025, Simo was announced as the new CEO of Applications at OpenAI, which led to her stepping down from the board. Presumably, this was meant to address the conflict of interest that would now be presented as a senior employee of the for-profit. However, the prospect of securing this role and the likely pay package that will accompany it (Altman said that he expects her branch of the company “will one day become [a] multitrillion-dollar” business) could have influenced her decision-making when she was a member of the nonprofit board.
Instacart
Simo, as CEO of Instacart until early this May, had potential conflicts of interest while serving on the OpenAI board, including owning nearly $100 million in Instacart stock. Instacart has partnered extensively with OpenAI: ChatGPT offers an Instacart plug-in, OpenAI’s Operator was first unveiled with an Instacart use case, and Fidji has described the partnership with OpenAI as stemming from the fact that AI “powers every part of [her] business.” As with other potential conflicts on the board, OpenAI’s continued scaling and commercialization would likely help Instacart’s business.
Fidji Simo
Former Board Member
Fidji Simo
—
Former Board Member
Methodology Note
All claims indicate potential, rather than confirmed, conflicts of interest given publicly available information. We are unaware of the exact nature of board members' personal investments and affiliations, or OpenAI's internal conflict of interest policies and practices.
Methodology Note
All claims indicate potential, rather than confirmed, conflicts of interest given publicly available information. We are unaware of the exact nature of board members' personal investments and affiliations, or OpenAI's internal conflict of interest policies and practices.
Methodology Note
All claims indicate potential, rather than confirmed, conflicts of interest given publicly available information. We are unaware of the exact nature of board members' personal investments and affiliations, or OpenAI's internal conflict of interest policies and practices.
Legal
The OpenAI Files is the most comprehensive collection to date of publicly documented concerns with governance practices, leadership integrity, and organizational culture at OpenAI.
© 2025 The Midas Project & The Tech Oversight Project. All rights reserved.
The OpenAI Files was created with complete editorial independence. We have received no funding, editorial direction, assistance, or support of any kind from Elon Musk, xAI, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Microsoft, or any other OpenAI competitor. This report is guided solely by our commitment to corporate accountability and public interest research.
© 2025 The Midas Project & The Tech Oversight Project.
All rights reserved.
The OpenAI Files was created with complete editorial independence. We have received no funding, editorial direction, assistance, or support of any kind from Elon Musk, xAI, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Microsoft, or any other OpenAI competitor. This report is guided solely by our commitment to corporate accountability and public interest research.
The OpenAI Files is the most comprehensive collection to date of publicly documented concerns with governance practices, leadership integrity, and organizational culture at OpenAI.
Legal
The OpenAI Files is the most comprehensive collection to date of publicly documented concerns with governance practices, leadership integrity, and organizational culture at OpenAI.
© 2025 The Midas Project & The Tech Oversight Project. All rights reserved.
The OpenAI Files was created with complete editorial independence. We have received no funding, editorial direction, assistance, or support of any kind from Elon Musk, xAI, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Microsoft, or any other OpenAI competitor. This report is guided solely by our commitment to corporate accountability and public interest research.