OpenAI says Sam Altman to return as CEO just days after the board sacked him and he said he'd join Microsoft

San Francisco — OpenAI said Tuesday that its co-founder Sam Altman would return to the tech company as CEO, just days after he was fired by its board and then quickly announced that he was joining Microsoft.

"We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board of Bret Taylor (Chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D'Angelo," OpenAI said in a post on the social media platform X.

In his own statement on the platform, Altman said he loved OpenAI and that everything he'd done "over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together."