Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s No. 2 Executive, to Step Down to Focus on Recovery From Chronic Illness

Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s CEO of AGI Deployment and the company’s No. 2 executive, will step down from her full-time role following a three-month medical leave, she said in a note on X on Thursday.

“Three months ago, I had to go on medical leave after a severe exacerbation of a chronic illness I’ve lived with for seven years,” she wrote on X. “During that time, it became clear that the road to recovery would be much longer and more complex than I had anticipated — and that I needed to focus on it fully.”

Simo will transition to a part-time role within the company, and she said she believes the best use of AI is to help cure diseases. She thanked CEO Sam Altman, president Greg Brockman and the company’s board for supporting her throughout the leave, which started in April.

“More than ever, I believe that some of the most important opportunities for AI lie in helping people solve real problems in their daily lives: their health, their finances, their time and the everyday burdens that shape human experience,” she wrote, later adding, “For now, my focus is recovery. But my belief in the potential of technology to solve deeply human problems has never been stronger.”

Simo’s leave came after