Astral to join OpenAI

I started Astral to make programming more productive.

From the beginning, our goal has been to build tools that radically change what it feels like to
work with Python – tools that feel fast, robust, intuitive, and integrated.

Today, we’re taking a step forward in that mission by announcing that we’ve entered into an
agreement to join OpenAI as part of the Codex
team.

Over the past few years, our tools have grown from zero to hundreds of millions of downloads per
month across Ruff, uv, and
ty. The Astral toolchain has become foundational to modern Python
development. The numbers – and the impact – went far beyond my most ambitious expectations at every
step of the way.

Open source is at the heart of that impact and the heart of that story; it sits at the center of
everything we do. In line with our philosophy and
OpenAI’s own announcement, OpenAI will
continue supporting our open source tools after the deal closes. We’ll keep building in the open,
alongside our community – and for the broader Python ecosystem – just as we have from the start.

I view building tools as an incredibly high-leverage endeavor. As I wrote in our
launch post three years ago: “If you could make
the Python ecosystem even 1% more productive, imagine how that impact would compound?”

Today, AI is rapidly changing the way we build software, and the pace of that change is only
accelerating. If our goal is to make programming more productive, then building at the frontier of
AI and software feels like the highest-leverage thing we can do.

It is increasingly clear to me that Codex is that frontier. And by
bringing Astral’s tooling and expertise to OpenAI, we’re putting ourselves in a position to push it
forward. After joining the Codex team, we’ll continue building our open source tools, explore ways
they can work more seamlessly with Codex, and expand our reach to think more broadly about the
future of software development.

Through it all, though, our goal remains the same: to make programming more productive. To build
tools that radically change what it feels like to build software.

On a personal note, I want to say thank you, first, to the Astral team, who have always put our
users first and shipped some of the most beloved software in the world. You’ve pushed me to be a
better leader and a better programmer. I am so excited to keep building with you.

Second, to our investors, especially
Casey Aylward from Accel, who led our Seed and
Series A, and Jennifer Li from Andreessen Horowitz, who led
our Series B. As a first-time, technical, solo founder, you showed far more belief in me than I ever
showed in myself, and I will never forget that.

And third, to our users. Our tools exist because of you. Thank you for your trust. We won’t let you
down.