Barret Zoph, Luke Metz, and Sam Schoenholz rejoin OpenAI from Mira Murati’s startup, boosting research and post-training capabilities while strengthening open source AI connections.
OpenAI has welcomed back three high-profile researchers—Barret Zoph, Luke Metz, and Sam Schoenholz—following a brief tenure at former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati’s AI startup, Thinking Machines. Their return comes at a critical time, reinforcing OpenAI’s technical leadership amid intense competition for AI talent, particularly from Google.
Under the new organisational structure, Barret Zoph reports directly to OpenAI applications CEO Fidji Simo, while Metz and Schoenholz report to Zoph. Simo confirmed that the return had been in the works for several weeks. While specific project details remain undisclosed, the trio’s comeback is expected to strengthen OpenAI’s core research and post-training capabilities.
Thinking Machines, launched by Murati in early 2025 as a public benefit corporation based in San Francisco, focuses on building collaborative multimodal AI systems with humans rather than fully automated AI. Murati announced Zoph’s exit from the startup on X, stating: “We have parted ways with Barret Zoph. Soumith Chintala will be the new CTO of Thinking Machines.”
Chintala is a prominent AI figure, noted for his work at Meta and as co-creator of PyTorch, the open-source machine learning framework. His leadership underscores the startup’s open-source ethos and collaborative focus.
The return of these researchers not only strengthens OpenAI’s internal capabilities but also maintains strong ties to the open-source AI community through Chintala’s influence and PyTorch connections. This move is expected to accelerate development in multimodal AI systems and reinforce OpenAI’s role in advancing accessible, transparent, and human-centric AI technologies.
