OpenAI has hired Peter Steinberger, the developer behind the viral open-source framework OpenClaw, in a gambit to move beyond traditional chatbots and toward artificial intelligence (AI) agents.
The appointment, announced Sunday by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, brings aboard Steinberger, an Austrian developer who created OpenClaw (formerly known as Clawdbot and Moltbot) as a tool for building personal AI agents.
Unlike standard AI that simply responds to prompts, OpenClaw allows software to operate with system-level permissions to manage calendars, send messages on platforms like Slack and WhatsApp, and interact with other AI agents to complete multi-step workflows.
Altman hailed Steinberger as a “genius” on social media, noting that his vision for multi-agent systems will “quickly become core” to OpenAI’s product offerings. Steinberger is expected to join the Codex team, focusing on the next generation of personal agents.
The acquisition comes at a time of open-wallet competition among AI giants. OpenAI was recently valued at $500 billion. Anthropic, a chief rival, reached a $380 billion valuation this week and has seen success with its own agentic tool, Claude Code.
To allay fears within the developer community, Altman confirmed that OpenClaw will transition into an independent foundation. OpenAI has pledged to continue supporting the project as an open-source initiative. “The future is going to be extremely multi-agent,” Altman said, “and it’s important to us to support open source as part of that.”
Steinberger noted that while OpenClaw reached 1.5 million agents by early February, the costs of maintaining the viral project — roughly $20,000 per month — were becoming unsustainable as a solo endeavor. “What I want is to change the world, not build a large company,” Steinberger said, adding that OpenAI provides the resources necessary to make agents safe and accessible for mainstream users.
OpenClaw’s versatility has already made it a sensation in China, where it is frequently paired with local models like DeepSeek. Baidu has even announced plans to integrate OpenClaw directly into its primary smartphone app.
However, the rapid rise of agentic AI is not without controversy. Security researchers have raised alarms regarding the privacy risks of granting autonomous software access to sensitive financial data and personal communications.
Furthermore, the ability for users to tweak the open-source code presents potential cyberthreats that OpenAI will now have to navigate as it integrates the technology into its ecosystem.
