While announcing his departure from OpenAI in March 2024, Ilya Sutskever had asserted that he was moving on to work on a "personally meaningful" project. Well, that project has just managed to raise some serious funding, potentially hinting at Sutskever's ultimate ambitions of taking on OpenAI, which remains under the firm tutelage of Sam Altman.
While working as the chief scientist at OpenAI, Ilya Sutskever had backed a short-lived coup against the non-profit's CEO, Sam Altman, who was summarily dismissed by the board in late 2023 for his increasingly mercantile bent and his proclivity for pushing AI-related advancements without proper safeguards. Officially, the board cited Altman's lack of candidness in his communications as the primary stimulus for its punitive action.
That decision, however, precipitated a full-on revolt at OpenAI, with employees submitting their resignations en masse. Ultimately, Altman was able to return to his post as the CEO after forcing the coup-supporting board to resign.
Once the proverbial dust settled, Ilya Sutskever expressed contrition for his role in the upheaval, going so far as to commit to "reunite the company." Eventually though, Sutskever resigned in March 2024 to form SSI, a new startup that aims to develop "safe" Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).
This brings us to today when Ilya Sustkever's SSI has now reached a major milestone, managing to raise $1 billion at a valuation of around $5 billion. While SSI currently has only 10 employees, it aims to utilize its new funding to purchase high-performance computing and attract talent, with teams split between Palo Alto, California, and Tel Aviv, Israel.
For comparison, OpenAI was just valued at $100 billion, constituting a $20 billion increase from just eight months ago. The non-profit is on track to earn $3.4 billion in revenue in 2024.
About the author: Writing is my one incontrovertible passion. Over the past six years, he has authored over 2,200 distinct articles on financial and tech-related topics, spanning nearly 1 million words. And he has been a member of Wcctech mobile team since 2025. As an alumnus of the University of Toronto, Rotman Commerce Program, I bring nuance, in-depth knowledge, and a unique perspective to every topic that I cover. When I'm not writing, I'm traveling the world, exploring hidden confectionaries and restaurants as an aspiring food connoisseur.
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