OpenAI has named Mike Liberatore, former finance chief at Elon Musk’s xAI, as its business finance officer, overseeing the company’s sprawling infrastructure investments.
Liberatore, who left xAI in July after three months, starts Tuesday and will report to CFO Sarah Friar while working closely with Greg Brockman’s team on compute strategy.
The move comes amid escalating tensions between OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Musk.
The two co-founded OpenAI in 2015 but have become rivals as the company shifted from nonprofit research lab to a commercial enterprise financed largely by Microsoft.
Musk sued OpenAI last year over alleged contract breaches and opposed its transition to a for-profit structure.
Last week, OpenAI announced that its nonprofit parent will maintain oversight while holding an equity stake valued over $100 billion.
OpenAI, valued at $500 billion, has expanded its compute commitments, including a $300 billion deal with Oracle.
Liberatore brings nearly a decade of experience at Airbnb and prior roles at SquareTrade, eBay, and PayPal.
At xAI, he arranged a $5 billion debt sale and $5 billion equity raise backed partly by SpaceX and oversaw major data center expansions.
