OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced on May 31 that the company has formalized an internal initiative as OpenAI Robotics and is actively recruiting full-stack hardware, operations, systems, and machine learning engineers. The team evolved directly from OpenAI’s world simulation research program, which Altman said was led by Aditya Ramesh. Short-term focus is on robots that support skilled workers building infrastructure; the long-term vision, as Altman put it, is “everyone having a personal robot doing anything they need.” He described the team’s work as grounded in tight co-design between robotics hardware and ML research, and said progress has been rapid. Greg Brockman amplified the announcement the same day. Applications can be sent to [email protected].
The public announcement is OpenAI’s most explicit signal to date of ambitions extending beyond software into physical AI, placing it in direct competition with Tesla Optimus, Figure AI, Physical Intelligence, and Elon Musk’s own robotics ventures. Altman’s framing of near-term deployment around skilled trades and infrastructure construction reflects where the industry broadly sees humanoid robots as most near-term viable, ahead of general household use. The announcement also comes as OpenAI is reportedly targeting a workforce of around 8,000 by end-2026 — roughly double its current headcount — suggesting the robotics hiring push is one of several simultaneous expansions across the company.