Another key figure at Anthropic has defected to OpenAI, as Austin Lau, the company's first growth marketing employee, has also departed.

Beating AI News Flash: Following Claude Code Product Lead Cat Wu's announcement of joining OpenAI, former Anthropic growth marketing core member Austin Lau has also publicly revealed his new destination: OpenAI.

Austin joined Anthropic in 2024 as the company's fifth marketing employee and its first dedicated to growth marketing. At the time, Anthropic did not yet have a mature growth marketing system; he single-handedly managed this work for nearly 10 months and also used Claude to build automated tools for ad management and budget monitoring.

Austin did not disclose his specific role at OpenAI. He thanked his Anthropic colleagues and said he is looking forward to his next chapter.

He also took the opportunity to compare the two companies' office perks: "Anthropic has better coffee and drinks, OpenAI has better snacks."