Why the departure of OpenAI’s data center chief is not a good look

Welcome to AI Decoded, Fast Company‘s weekly newsletter that breaks down the most important news in the world of AI. I’m Mark Sullivan, a senior writer at Fast Company, covering emerging tech, AI, and tech policy. Sign up to receive this newsletter every week via email here. And if you have comments on this issue and/or ideas for future ones, drop me a line at sullivan@fastcompany.com, and follow me on X @thesullivan. Another OpenAI exec leaves the company OpenAI hired Chris Malone to manage its data center build-out in March 2025, just after the company announced its massive Stargate data center project with SoftBank and Oracle, The Wall Street Journal reported. Stargate was unveiled with fanfare in a chummy Oval Office announcement featuring OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman; SoftBank’s CEO, Masayoshi Son; Oracle’s chairman and CTO, Larry Ellison; and President Donald Trump. Malone, who left OpenAI last week, had already been moved down in the organization. After a reorganization earlier this year, he no longer reported to the president, Greg Brockman, and instead became cohead of a technical engineering team under VP Sachin Katti. In July, OpenAI promoted Uday Ruddarraju to chief techno…