OpenAI CEO's threat to quit EU draws lawmaker backlash

FILE PHOTO: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman testifies before a Senate Judiciary Privacy, Technology & the Law Subcommittee hearing titled 'Oversight of A.I.: Rules for Artificial Intelligence' on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., May 16, 2023. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz

LONDON/STOCKHOLM (Reuters) -For months, Sam Altman, CEO of Microsoft-backed OpenAI has urged lawmakers around the world to draw up new rules governing the technology. On Wednesday, he threatened the ChatGPT maker may leave the EU if the bloc "overregulated".

Altman has spent the past week crisscrossing Europe, meeting top politicians in France, Spain, Poland, Germany and the UK to discuss the future of AI, and progress of ChatGPT.