Sam Altman leaves Oklo board, Jacob DeWitte steps up

Sam Altman, co-founder and chief executive officer of OpenAI, is stepping down as chairman of the board of nuclear power company Oklo, according to a company statement Wednesday.

Jacob DeWitte, Oklo CEO and co-founder, will serve as chairman and board member in Altman’s place.

“As Oklo explores strategic partnerships to deploy clean energy at scale, particularly to enable the deployment of AI, I believe now is the right time for me to step down,” Altman said in the statement on the Oklo website. 

Altman was an early-stage investor in Oklo, and told CNBC in July 2023 that nuclear energy is the best way to solve problems in artificial intelligence without relying on nonrenewable sources such as fossil fuels.

Jacob DeWitte, Oklo CEO and co-founder, will serve as chairman and board member in Altman’s place.

Oklo, originally a startup of 22 people run off of private investments, went public last year when it merged with AltC Acquisition, a special purpose acquisition company also founded and led by Altman. Oklo received about $306 million in the merger and the company was valued at $364 million after the trade, Oklo wrote last May.

Oklo’s goal is to use mini nuclear reactors that run off of nuclear waste, and then sell the energy produced to players such as the Air Force and tech companies. Recently in March, Oklo lined up an agreement with the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory to assist the company’s plans to build its first advanced nuclear plant.

Also in March, Oklo said it would try once more at securing a federal license for a small modular reactor after the Nuclear Regulatory Commission denied the company in 2022.