Former OpenAI Chief Scientist Starting New AI Firm

Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI’s co-founder and former chief scientist, is starting a new AI company that will focus on the safety of users. In a recent post, Sutskever unveiled Safe Superintelligence Inc. (SSI), a startup with “one goal and one product:” offering a safe and powerful AI system to users.

Going by the announcement, SSI is a startup that “approaches safety and capabilities in tandem,” allowing the company to swiftly move ahead with its AI system while still prioritizing safety. The startup also put the external pressure AI teams at companies such as OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google often face, saying the company’s “singular focus” lets it move past the “distraction by management overhead or product cycles.”

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Will SSI Also Partner With Firms Like Apple And Microsoft

“Our business model means safety, security, and progress are all insulated from short-term commercial pressures,” the announcement reads. “This way, we can scale in peace.” Besides, SSI is co-founded by Daniel Gross, a former AI lead at Apple, and Daniel Levy, who was previously a member of technical staff at OpenAI.

In 2023, Sutskever was one of the people to push to oust OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. Sutskever resigned from her post in May and hinted at starting a new project. Soon after Sutskever’s departure, AI researcher Jan Leike resigned from OpenAI, citing safety processes that have “taken a backseat to shiny products.”

As OpenAI moves forward with new partnerships with Microsoft and Apple, we might not see SSI doing the same anytime soon. During an interview with Bloomberg, Sutskever said SSI’s first product will be superintelligent and will be safe to use, and SSI “will not do anything else” until then.

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OpenAI’s GPT-5 Will Come With PhD-Level Intelligence

The next major upgrade for ChatGPT has been rumored for a very long time. GPT-5, or whatever it will be named, has been talked about several times in the past few months. But recently, OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati has provided some additional clarity on its capabilities.

During an interview with Dartmouth Engineering that was posted on X, Murati explained the jump from GPT-4 to GPT-5 as someone growing from a high-schooler up to university.

“If you look at the trajectory of improvement, systems like GPT-3 were maybe toddler-level intelligence,” Murati says. “And then systems like GPT-4 are more like smart high-schooler intelligence. And then, in the next couple of years, we’re looking at Ph.D. intelligence for specific tasks. Things are changing and improving pretty rapidly.”