A leading e-commerce executive will soon head OpenAI’s applications business.
Instacart CEO Fidji Simo, 39, announced on Wednesday in a LinkedIn post that she is leaving the grocery delivery service to join OpenAI as CEO of Applications later this year. In the new role, she will lead OpenAI’s products, including ChatGPT, and report directly to CEO Sam Altman, 40.
Simo wrote that she will remain CEO of Instacart “for a couple of months” to ensure a smooth transition. Even after she leaves, she will remain the chair of Instacart’s board.
“Let me start by saying this was an incredibly hard decision because I love this company,” Simo wrote in the LinkedIn post, which was a copy of a message she sent to the Instacart team.
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Simo wrote that her “passion for AI” and “the potential it has to cure diseases” persuaded her to join OpenAI. Wired reported on Wednesday that OpenAI is in talks with the FDA to use AI for drug evaluations, potentially speeding up the time it takes for a drug to hit the market. Simo, meanwhile, is co-founder and president of a medical research center called Metrodora, which focuses on diagnosing and treating neuroimmune disorders.
“The ability to lead such an important part of our collective future was a hard opportunity to pass up,” Simo stated.
In an OpenAI blog post on Wednesday, Altman wrote that Simo, who joined OpenAI’s board last year, had “already contributed a great deal” to the company. He did not provide specific examples of Simo’s contributions, but wrote that she would now be responsible for helping lead the company through a new phase of growth. In March, OpenAI finalized a $40 billion fundraising round that valued the company at $300 billion. This week, OpenAI announced that its non-profit arm would continue to control its for-profit business to ensure OpenAI’s mission of AI that “benefits all of humanity.”
The Applications division is one of OpenAI’s three core businesses (Research and Compute and the other two). Altman wrote in a post on X that Simo’s appointment means he can focus more on research as the company works towards superintelligence, AI that surpasses human intelligence in all areas.
so excited that @fidjissimo is joining openai in a new role: ceo of applications, reporting to me.
i’ll remain ceo of openai, but in this new configuration i’ll be able to increase my focus on research, compute, and safety.
these are critical as we approach superintelligence.— Sam Altman (@sama) May 8, 2025
Bloomberg reports that OpenAI’s Chief Operating Officer Brad Lightcap, Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar, and Chief Product Officer Kevin Weil will report to Simo when she joins OpenAI.
Simo has been the CEO of Instacart since 2021, leading the company through the pandemic and to a September 2023 initial public offering. Since the company went public, Instacart shares have grown by over 47% at the time of writing. The company saw its first quarter revenue for 2025 increase 9% year-over-year to $897 million, with order volume up 14%.
Before Instacart, Simo worked at Meta for a decade and held the role of vice president and head of the Facebook app from 2019 to 2021. She introduced ads to the Facebook app and built Facebook Live, overseeing a team of 6,000 people.
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