Nscale Adds Ex-OpenAI Exec Simo to Board — SkimNews
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- Nscale appointed former OpenAI executive Fidji Simo to its board, where she joins Sheryl Sandberg, Susan Decker, and Nick Clegg ahead of the startup's anticipated fall IPO.
- Fidji Simo previously served as CEO of AGI deployment at OpenAI — effectively the No. 2 executive — and departed the company in July citing health reasons, though she continues advising OpenAI on a part-time basis.
- Simo led grocery delivery company Instacart through its 2023 IPO, spent more than a decade at Meta including as head of the Facebook app, and currently sits on Shopify's board.
- Nscale founder and CEO Josh Payne praised Simo's experience scaling products used by billions, framing her appointment as central to building AI infrastructure at global scale.
- Nscale is reportedly raising up to $3.5 billion ahead of its planned IPO, per Bloomberg, after its valuation skyrocketed within just two years of its founding.
Why it matters: A board stacked with former Big Tech heavyweights — including someone who already shepherded Instacart through a 2023 IPO — gives a two-year-old startup the institutional credibility needed to justify a reported $3.5 billion pre-IPO raise and signals how fiercely competitive the AI infrastructure race has become among non-U.S. players.
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