OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever says he’s getting into the CEO position at Protected Superintelligence, the AI startup he launched in 2024. In a put up on X, Sutskever confirmed Thursday that Daniel Gross, the startup’s co-founder and CEO, departed the corporate as of June 29. Protected Superintelligence co-founder Daniel Levy is turning into president of the startup, based on Sutskever.
The announcement follows weeks of reporting that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was in superior talks to rent Gross, in addition to his longtime investing accomplice, former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman. At one level, Zuckerberg reportedly tried to amass all of Protected Superintelligence, a startup most not too long ago valued at $32 billion. Sutskever addressed these stories as effectively.
“You may need heard rumors of firms seeking to purchase us. We’re flattered by their consideration however are targeted on seeing our work by means of,” mentioned Sutskever. “We’ve the compute, we have now the workforce, and we all know what to do. Collectively we’ll preserve constructing protected superintelligence.”
I despatched the next message to our workforce and buyers:—As you understand, Daniel Gross’s time with us has been winding down, and as of June 29 he’s formally not part of SSI. We’re grateful for his early contributions to the corporate and want him effectively in his subsequent…— Ilya Sutskever (@ilyasut) July 3, 2025
Naturally, Gross’ departure might elevate questions across the startup. If Protected Superintelligence was near its aim — certainly a groundbreaking know-how, because it’s described — why would its co-founder go away to start out one thing new, seemingly at Meta?
Notably, Protected Superintelligence describes itself because the world’s “first straight-shot SSI lab,” that means the corporate has no different merchandise or ambitions exterior of creating, effectively, protected superintelligence. That’s the identify, that’s the product, that’s its complete factor. Sutskever began Protected Superintelligence shortly after leaving OpenAI, the place he performed a job within the temporary ousting of CEO Sam Altman.
In the meantime, it appears probably that Meta Superintelligence Labs will develop know-how that powers plenty of the corporate’s merchandise. In Zuckerberg’s memo saying the brand new unit, he referenced Meta’s experience in constructing and rising merchandise that attain billions of individuals, and cited the early wins Meta has had in AI wearables.
Which means Gross, who beforehand led AI groups at Apple after the iPhone maker acquired his startup, might have a extra acquainted position at Meta, ought to he be a part of. Zuckerberg has additionally nabbed some prime researchers from OpenAI and Google DeepMind to fill out his new AI workforce.
Nonetheless, Sutskever might have his palms full as Protected Superintelligence’s CEO. Whereas he’s held earlier high-ranking positions, corresponding to OpenAI’s chief scientist, the CEO position might include new challenges — corresponding to elevating new capital from buyers and recruiting prime expertise. Sutskever notes in his put up that he’ll proceed to supervise Protected Superintelligence’s technical workforce.
