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The Unrelenting Ambition of Sam Altman
Loopt, Y Combinator, OpenAI, and Investing in a Bright Future
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Sam Altman
Sam Altman is the epitome of ambition. He is the co-founder & CEO of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT and DALL·E 2, that’s reportedly valued at $29 billion. Previously, he was President at Y Combinator (YC), a behemoth in the venture industry and the world’s best startup accelerator, with companies that include Airbnb, Stripe, Instacart, and Dropbox among others. At 19, he dropped out of Stanford to start Loopt, selling it at age 26 for $43 million.
In 2009, Paul Graham, co-founder of YC, named Sam one of the five most interesting founders of the last 30 years, along with people like Steve Jobs and the founders of Google, writing:
Honestly, Sam is, along with Steve Jobs, the founder I refer to most when I'm advising startups. On questions of design, I ask ‘What would Steve do?’ but on questions of strategy or ambition I ask ‘What would Sam do?’
At the time, Sam was only 24 years old, and that was 3 years after he’d been compared to Bill Gates in another Paul Graham essay.
Oh, and we haven’t even mentioned Sam’s angel investments.
Sam has made sizable investments in a number of notable companies.
One that stands out?
His largest investment to date - a $375 million investment into Helion, a nuclear fusion company, as part of a $500 million funding round.
Yes, $375 million of his own money was invested into one company.
Let’s dive into how Sam Altman became Sam Altman, the scope of his ambitions, and some lessons we can take from him.
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