OpenAI’s Sam Altman says ‘we know how to build AGI’

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says that the company is confident that it knows “how to build AGI as we have traditionally understood it,” referring to the tech industry’s long-sought benchmark of artificial general intelligence. And he predicts that AI agents capable of autonomously performing certain tasks may start to “materially change the output of companies” this year.

Altman made the announcement in a blog post published on Monday, where he discussed the past and future of OpenAI. The company’s next goal is “superintelligence in the true sense of the word,” he says. “We love our current products, but we are here for the glorious future. Superintelligent tools could massively accelerate scientific discovery and innovation well beyond what we are capable of doing on our own, and in turn massively increase abundance and prosperity.”

Downplaying its previous definition of AGI may work in OpenAI’s favor, since the company is tied to Microsoft via exclusivity deals it made in 2023 until OpenAI officially declares that AGI has been achieved. But reports that Microsoft itself classifies AGI as a system capable of generating $100 billion in profits may prove that loophole ineffective. And while The Verge has heard that OpenAI plans to blend its large language models together as an “AGI” offering, potentially to hit this goalpost faster, the company isn’t turning a profit. Altman also says it’s currently losing money on its $200-per-month ChatGPT Pro subscriptions.

“People use it much more than we expected,” Altman wrote across several posts on X. “I personally chose the price and thought we would make some money.”

“The whole event was, in my opinion, a big failure of governance by well-meaning people, myself included. Looking back, I certainly wish I had done things differently, and I’d like to believe I’m a better, more thoughtful leader today than I was a year ago,” Altman said. “Good governance requires a lot of trust and credibility. I appreciate the way so many people worked together to build a stronger system of governance for OpenAI that enables us to pursue our mission of ensuring that AGI benefits all of humanity.”