The Sam Altman Drama: Lessons in AI Vendor Risk

If you've been paying attention this week, you saw OpenAI implode and then reassemble in 72 hours. Sam Altman was fired, then rehired. The board was cleared. The company is effectively under different control than it was last Monday.

It all worked out (for now), but the chaos raises a critical question for professional services firms: what happens to your AI strategy if your vendor has a governance crisis?

This is real vendor risk, and I want to talk about it directly.

What Actually Happened

The details don't matter as much as the lesson. OpenAI's board fired the CEO. The company nearly disintegrated. Employees threatened to leave. Microsoft (a major investor) was ready to hire everyone.

Within three days, it was reassembled. But for 72 hours, there was genuine uncertainty about whether OpenAI would survive as the company you've been integrating with.

The Vendor Risk Question

If you've bet your firm's AI strategy on ChatGPT or OpenAI's API, you should be thinking about: what happens if OpenAI fails? What happens if the company pivots and no longer offers the service you're using?

This isn't FUD. This is realistic risk analysis.

Three scenarios to consider:

Scenario 1: OpenAI Gets Acquired

Microsoft would likely be the acquirer. They'd probably keep the service running (they've invested heavily). But terms might change. Pricing might go up. Features might shift to prioritize Microsoft's interests.

Scenario 2: OpenAI Becomes Less Focused on Enterprise

Right now, OpenAI is making money from ChatGPT Plus and enterprise customers. If that changes—if they pivot to consumer applications, or focus more on research—enterprise support could suffer.

Scenario 3: A Competitor Becomes Better and More Reliable

This is already happening. Claude is getting better. Google's Gemini is coming. Microsoft's Copilot products are improving. If your vendor has governance problems, it's easier to switch to a competitor.

How to Manage Vendor Risk

1. Don't Bet Everything on One Vendor

If OpenAI is 80% of your AI strategy, you're over-concentrated. Diversify: use OpenAI for some tasks, Claude for others, Google for others.

This adds complexity, but it protects you from vendor-specific risk.

2. Prioritize Portability

Design your AI implementations so they're not tightly coupled to one vendor. If you've built custom GPTs that only work with OpenAI, and OpenAI fails, you're stuck.

Better to build with the Assistants API (which is more open) or with open-source models that can be run on your own infrastructure.

3. Keep Strategic Distance

Don't let AI become so central to your operations that a vendor problem becomes an existential crisis for your firm.

If your intake process, your email management, and your research system all depend on OpenAI, and OpenAI has problems, your firm can't function. That's too much concentration.

4. Watch for Red Flags

Governance problems, leadership instability, unclear business model, lack of enterprise focus—these are signals. If you see them, don't double down on the vendor.

5. Monitor Alternatives

Don't fall asleep because your current vendor is good. Claude is improving faster than most people realize. Llama is getting better. Google's capabilities are expanding.

Every 6 months, run a vendor evaluation. Ask: "If we were starting from scratch today, would we still choose OpenAI?" If the answer is "no," start transitioning.

The Honest Assessment

OpenAI is still the best generalist AI platform for most professional services use cases. But they're not immune to business, governance, or strategic risk.

The firms that will succeed long-term are the ones that use OpenAI because it's the best choice for their needs, not because they're locked in.

Think about portability. Think about alternatives. Think about what happens if your vendor has a crisis. That's not pessimism—that's responsible business planning.