OpenAI loses another executive: Chris Malone, head of data centres exits amid executive shake-up

Former head of data centers at OpenAI, Chris Malone, has departed from the company, as reported by The Wall Street Journal. This transition occurs as OpenAI reorganises internal teams, expands its data-center infrastructure, and readies itself for a prospective public listing amid heightening industry-wide demand for compute resources.

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OpenAI’s head of data centres leaves

Malone joined OpenAI in March 2025, shortly after it announced Stargate, its large-scale data-centre project with SoftBank and Oracle. Before OpenAI, he spent nearly five years at Meta and more than a decade at Google.

During a recent infrastructure reorganisation, Malone stopped reporting directly to President Greg Brockman and began reporting to Vice President Sachin Katti, who took over leadership of the group. Malone later left the company.

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OpenAI said it has a strong, deeply experienced data-centre team with clear leadership and the technical expertise needed to execute its plans.

Who is overseeing OpenAI’s data-centre strategy?

Several executives now oversee the infrastructure effort. Uday Ruddarraju leads OpenAI’s data-centre team, Brent Mayo heads the data-centre build and delivery programme, while Spas Lazarov leads data-centre engineering.

The changes come as OpenAI ramps up spending. OpenAI is projected to spend as much as $750 billion on computing through 2030 and has signed a 10-gigawatt data-centre lease in Ohio with SB Energy.

Another senior exit at OpenAI

Malone’s departure adds to more than a dozen executive exits this year, including former COO Brad Lightcap, former chief revenue officer Denise Dresser and Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s de facto second-in-command.

The turnover comes as OpenAI prepares for a potential IPO, reportedly pushed to 2027 from this year. At the same time, the company faces pressure to expand computing capacity as competition from rivals such as Anthropic intensifies.