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OpenAI’s chief people officer, Julia Villagra, is exiting the company on Friday, the company told Business Insider.
Villagra has been with OpenAI since February 2024, when she joined as head of human resources, according to her LinkedIn profile.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced in March that she had been promoted to the chief people officer role.
Before OpenAI, Villagra spent nearly 16 years at Hudson River Trading, where she was the head of people. Last year, OpenAI poached a handful of people from the quant firm’s HR and recruiting teams, including Villagra.
The company told Reuters that OpenAI’s recently appointed CEO of applications, Fidji Simo, will be hiring for a new chief people officer. In the interim, Jason Kwon, the chief strategy officer, will be leading Villagra’s role.
Reuters, which first reported the news of Villagra’s departure, said the exec “is leaving to pursue her personal passion of using art, music and storytelling to help people understand the transition to artificial general intelligence.”
OpenAI confirmed the news of Villagra’s departure and declined to comment on her replacement. Villagra did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
AI talent shake-up
Villagra’s exit marks the latest shake-up at OpenAI as competition for AI talent intensifies.
Her departure comes just months after Simo joined OpenAI’s leadership team, taking on responsibilities across its consumer and product initiatives.
Altman said in a June podcast that Meta has tried to recruit OpenAI employees by offering them $100 million signing bonuses if they jumped ship.
He added that he found it “crazy” that Meta was willing to spend so much to acquire talent. Meta pushed back, saying that the signing bonuses were not that generous.
Meta has put the brakes on its red-hot AI hiring spree. In a statement to Business Insider, the company called the hiring freeze in its artificial-intelligence division “basic organizational planning.”
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