India AI Summit Disorganization and Amodei’s Candid Remarks on Altman
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei on Thursday described the India AI Impact Summit, held earlier this year in New Delhi, as 'extremely disorganized', saying participants were repeatedly repositioned moments before a group photograph. 'If you have ever been to one of these summits, not saying anything bad particularly about India, all of these international summits with heads of states are super disorganised', Amodei said in an interview with Bloomberg.
An awkward on-stage incident between Amodei and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman had sparked speculation about growing tensions between the rival AI companies. As seen in the pictures, Amodei and Altman did not hold hands. However, Amodei dismissed such claims, saying the incident was simply the result of confusion and last-minute changes during a poorly coordinated event.
Held in February at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi, the India AI Impact Summit brought together delegates from more than 90 countries, including policymakers, researchers, and technology executives, to discuss global cooperation, responsible AI development, and equitable access to artificial intelligence. The summit called for democratic access to AI technologies, greater international collaboration, and the development of governance frameworks to ensure that AI benefits are distributed more equitably.
The event drew some of the biggest names in artificial intelligence, including Altman, Amodei, and senior executives from Google, Microsoft, and other technology companies. However, the summit was not without controversies. Beyond the viral photo-op, the opening day was marked by long queues, overcrowding, and technical glitches, prompting complaints from delegates over crowd management and event logistics.
Galgotias University also came under scrutiny after representatives at its exhibition stall falsely claimed that a Chinese-made robotic dog was an in-house innovation. Following widespread criticism, the university apologised and was asked to vacate its pavilion at the summit. The summit also became the centre of a political row when workers from the Indian Youth Congress staged a shirtless protest inside the exhibition hall.
Before founding Anthropic in 2021, Amodei worked as Vice President of Research at OpenAI for four years, from 2016 to 2020. At OpenAI, Amodei played a key role in developing some of the company's earliest large language models, including GPT-2 and GPT-3. He was also among the researchers who pioneered reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF), a technique that later became central to training conversational AI systems such as ChatGPT.
Amodei left OpenAI in late 2020 and went on to co-found Anthropic with his sister, Daniela Amodei, and several former OpenAI employees. He left OpenAI due to strategic and cultural differences, as media reports state. However, Amodei has said that disagreements over AI safety were not the sole reason for his exit. Speaking to Bloomberg, he said his decision was ultimately driven by concerns over trust, honesty, values, and organisational behaviour within OpenAI.
'Valid disagreements over safety existed,' Amodei told Bloomberg. Amodei said in the interview that he has made peace with the increasingly visible rivalry between Anthropic and OpenAI. However, while discussing his exit from OpenAI, Amodei also took a jab at Sam Altman without naming him. He said, 'At the end of the day, why argue with someone when you don't have the same vision and you don't trust them?' He further added, 'The way to resolve it is you go off and do your thing, they go off and do their thing.'
