2026-02-16 10:29:34| Engadget
Recently we were introduced to OpenClaw, an AI that allows users to create their own agents to control apps like email, Spotify and home controls. Now, Sam Altman has announced that OpenAI has absorbed OpenClaw by hiring developer Peter Steinberger "to drive the next generation of personal agents," he wrote on X. Steinberger confirmed the news on his own blog. "Im joining OpenAI to work on bringing agents to everyone. OpenClaw will move to a foundation and stay open and independent."
Steinberger was also in talks to join Meta, with both companies reportedly making offers in the "billions," according to Implicator.AI. The primary attractant was said to be OpenClaw's 196,000 GitHub stars and 2 million weekly visitors rather than its codebase.
OpenClaw became buzzy in the last few weeks thanks to its multifaceted ability to carry out tasks. People have used it to create agents that can write code, clear their inboxes, do online shopping and other assistant-like jobs. On its website, OpenClaw touts its ability to interact with popular apps and sites including WhatsApp, Discord, Slack, iMesage, Hue and Spotify.
Peter Steinberger is joining OpenAI to drive the next generation of personal agents. He is a genius with a lot of amazing ideas about the future of very smart agents interacting with each other to do very useful things for people. We expect this will quickly become core to our Sam Altman (@sama) February 15, 2026
OpenClaw was recently called "Clawdbot" but Anthropic forced a name change due to similarities with its "Claude" branding. OpenClaw is often compared to Claude Code by "vibe coders" seeking to automate website development and other programming chores.
In his announcement, Altman said that "the future is going to be extremely multi-agent and it's important to support open source as part of that," adding that "OpenClaw will live in a foundation as an open source project" supported by Open AI. Steinberger, meanwhile, said that "what I want is to change the world, not build a larger company and teaming up with OpenAI is the fastest way to bring this to everyone." This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/openai-has-hired-the-developer-behind-ai-agent-openclaw-092934041.html?src=rss
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