Samuel Harris Altman

Samuel Harris Altman, born on 22 April 1985 in Chicago, Illinois, is a prominent American entrepreneur and investor renowned for his leadership roles in the technology sector. Growing up in St. Louis, Missouri, Altman developed an early interest in computers, receiving his first computer at age eight. He attended Stanford University to study computer science but left in 2005 to pursue entrepreneurial ventures.

Altman initially gained recognition as the founder of Loopt, a location-based social networking mobile app. Despite raising over $30 million in venture capital, Loopt struggled to attract a substantial user base and was sold to Green Dot Corporation for $43.4 million in 2012. Following this, Altman joined Y Combinator, a prestigious startup accelerator, where he served as president from 2014 to 2019. During his tenure, he expanded the organisation’s reach and influence, contributing to the success of numerous startups including Reddit, Stripe, and Airbnb.

In 2015, Altman co-founded OpenAI, an artificial intelligence research organisation. He became CEO in 2019, and under his leadership, OpenAI transitioned from a non-profit to a for-profit entity. The company's notable advancements include the development of GPT-3, a sophisticated language model, and DALL-E, an AI capable of generating images from text descriptions. The release of ChatGPT in late 2022 further solidified OpenAI's prominence, leading to a significant $10 billion investment from Microsoft.

Altman has also been involved in clean energy ventures, serving as chairman of Oklo Inc. and Helion Energy. Recognised for his contributions to technology and investment, he was listed among Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people in 2023. He married Oliver Mulherin in 2024.