# Uday Ruddarraju named OpenAI's CTO of compute > Source: > Published: 2026-07-20 15:39:41+00:00 Uday Ruddarraju has been appointed the chief technology officer for compute at OpenAI. Ruddarraju was the head of infrastructure at xAI until last year, when he left ahead of a wave of departures at Elon Musk's generative AI business. Ruddarraju [joined OpenAI](https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/xais-head-of-infrastructure-uday-ruddarraju-departs/) last July as head of compute and infrastructure. "My first 12 months at OpenAI have been incredibly rewarding," Ruddarraju said on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7483625848621895680/). "Our Compute team has worked relentlessly to bring capacity online quickly and reliably, while doing the deep systems across compute, network, and storage, and ML work needed to train frontier models like GPT‑5.6. As we scale, the problems only get harder that require pushing the frontiers and innovating across every layer (literally) of the stack. "We’re on a mission to build the world’s largest compute footprint so frontier AI can reach everyone and every workflow. We have a very exciting compute ramp and roadmap coming up. There is a lot to build across large scale distributed systems, hardware, manufacturing, and data center builds spanning civil, mechanical, and electrical engineering. We’re hiring exceptional people across the stack." The former Robinhood and eBay executive pointed towards multiple data center jobs at the company, including for [data center compute infrastructure](https://openai.com/careers/data-center-compute-infrastructure-san-francisco/) and [software engineers for compute infrastructure](https://openai.com/careers/software-engineer-compute-infrastructure-san-francisco/). OpenAI has rapidly expanded its compute footprint via its Stargate joint venture and multiple cloud deals, but has struggled to hit deadlines [and seen some staff departures](https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/oracleopenai-drop-plans-to-expand-flagship-abilene-stargate-site-meta-in-talks-to-pick-up-crusoe-capacity-with-nvidias-help/). Last September, [xAI accused OpenAI](https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/musks-xai-claims-openai-hired-staff-to-steal-its-operational-advantages-in-launching-data-centers-in-latest-lawsuit/) of hiring a number of workers, including Ruddarraju, as part of a plan to steal data center trade secrets. OpenAI has rejected the claims and called the lawsuit just one of many attempts by Elon Musk to slow down its growth. The case was twice dismissed, with xAI now appealing to the Ninth Circuit. Ruddarraju has not been accused of any wrongdoing.