OpenAI has appointed Fidji Simo as chief executive of applications.

Simo joins the firm from Instacart, where she spent four years as chief executive.

Simo, who has been a member of OpenAI’s board since March 2024, also spent ten years working at Facebook where she held several roles including head of Facebook app.

In her new role, starting over the next few months, Simo will focus on scaling the company’s traditional functions during its next phase of growth.

She will report directly to chief executive Sam Altman.

In an open letter, Open AI’s chief executive Sam Altman wrote that the appointment was necessary as over the past two years OpenAI has turned into an infrastructure company which builds and delivers AI tools at an “unprecedented scale.”

Additionally, the company now has “hundreds of millions” of users around the world and is growing quickly.

Altman said he will remain chief executive of OpenAI and will continue to directly oversee operations across the research, compute and application areas of the company.

“Applications brings together a group of existing business and operational teams responsible for how our research reaches and benefits the world, and Fidji is uniquely qualified to lead this group,” Altman said. “Fidji brings a rare blend of leadership, product and operational expertise, and genuine commitment to ensuring our technology benefits everyone.”

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