Emad Mostaque has left Stability AI. The pioneering start-up that he founded in order to create images at will.
Mostaque was gifted and talented. He formed StabilityAI in order to promote the Stable Diffusion Tool, which allows users simply to type words into a program to create images.
After the success of ChatGPT, the company has been plagued by problems. There have been reports of disputes with investors, waves in senior staff leaving and a lawsuit by photography agency Getty Images alleging Stability used its copyright photos to train its AI. Some investors wanted Mostaque out of the company because they didn’t like the way he ran it.
He posted this on Twitter/X in the hours following his departure announcement on Saturday morning: “The concentration power in AI is bad to us all.” I decided to step aside to fix this problem at Stability & elsewhere.”
He said that his shares gave him “full control” of the board and the majority vote at the company.
Mostaque is a strong advocate of AI technology being made available to everyone, instead of being held by only a few giant companies. He tweeted Saturday morning that “centralised AI cannot be defeated by more centralised AI”.
Microsoft, an Open AI investor, announced a partnership with Inflection in a $650-million deal. This would allow Microsoft access to Inflection’s Pi chatbot, and the majority of Inflection’s staff. Microsoft claims that it is not an acquisition. However, some have interpreted the move as a tech giant with deep pockets monopolising talent in the industry.
Stable Diffusion’s director of strategic partnerships Tyler Saltsman and several key researchers resigned in March.
In the past year, other senior executives have also left the company, including the chief operating officer, its six vice presidents, and its general attorney. Ed Newton-Rex said that he resigned as a protest over Stability’s handling of copyrighted information.
Getty Images received permission to proceed with a trial in December against Stability AI after Getty accused Stable Diffusion of using images from its library that were protected by copyright.
Stability’s defence, filed last month by Stability, dismissed the accusations as “vague” and “general”.
Stability has also faced financial challenges. The company was valued at $1 billion in 2022. Mostaque, who reportedly spends $8 million per month on operations and tweeted last year about the company’s revenue of $1.2 million for August, reported that they were spending this amount.
Lightspeed Venture Partners and Coatue Management both resigned their board observer seats in October due to concerns about Mostaque’s leadership.
Coatue called on Mostaque, the chief executive of Stability AI, to resign.
Mostaque was accused of exaggerating his career and educational achievements in June last year. This included suggestions that he did not hold a master’s as claimed, but only a bachelor’s.