OpenAI’s head of data centers Chris Malone departs company

Chris Malone, the executive responsible for overseeing OpenAI’s data center operations, has left the company. His departure comes during a period of significant executive turnover at the AI company, which has been reshuffling its leadership ranks while simultaneously rethinking its approach to the massive computing infrastructure needed to power its AI models. Malone joined OpenAI in March 2025 after nearly five years as a distinguished engineer at Meta. His tenure coincided with some of the most consequential infrastructure decisions in the company’s history. A shifting data center strategy Under Malone’s watch, OpenAI underwent a notable pivot in how it plans to secure compute capacity. The company shifted away from relying heavily on the Stargate initiative, a joint venture focused on building high-capacity data infrastructure with partners including Microsoft, and moved toward leasing greater capacity from cloud providers instead. Malone was also vocal about OpenAI’s infrastructure ambitions during public industry events. At Yotta 2025, he discussed the company’s plans for multi-channel capacity and self-built facilities. The subsequent shift toward leasing suggests that pictur...