Kevin Weil and Bill Peebles exit OpenAI as company continues to shed ‘side quests’

OpenAI is undergoing significant changes, with the departure of two key figures behind its innovative projects. Kevin Weil, who spearheaded the company's scientific research initiatives, and Bill Peebles, known for his work on the AI video tool Sora, both announced their exits on Friday. These departures align with OpenAI's strategy to streamline its focus on enterprise AI and the development of its upcoming "superapp." Recent decisions have led to a reduction in various experimental projects, including Sora and OpenAI for Science. Sora, which was reportedly incurring losses of approximately $1 million daily in compute costs, was discontinued last month. Meanwhile, OpenAI for Science, the internal research group that developed the AI-driven Prism platform to expedite scientific discovery, is being integrated into other research teams, as noted in Weil's announcement. In his farewell message, Weil reflected on his transformative two-year journey at OpenAI, emphasizing the potential of accelerating scientific advancements as a significant benefit of their pursuit of artificial general intelligence (AGI). He also recalled the challenges faced by the team after the formal launch in October 2025, including a controversial tweet regarding GPT-5's capabilities that was quickly debunked by a mathematician. Peebles, in his own post about leaving, praised Sora for sparking substantial investment in the video sector and highlighted the necessity for research endeavors to operate outside the constraints of a company’s primary objectives. "Cultivating entropy is essential for the long-term success of a research lab," he stated, underscoring the importance of creative freedom in scientific exploration.