Ajeya Cotra

Ajeya Cotra is an AI-risk researcher who joined Open Philanthropy in July 2016, was still on its staff in November 2023, and later joined the technical staff of the AI evaluation nonprofit METR.¹² She holds a B.S. in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California, Berkeley, where, according to her Open Philanthropy biography, she "founded the Effective Altruists of Berkeley student group and taught a course on effective altruism."¹

Open Philanthropy

Cotra joined Open Philanthropy in July 2016 as a research analyst. Her archived biography of November 2023 gave her title as senior program officer for "Potential Risks from Advanced AI" and stated that she "leads Open Phil's grantmaking on technical research that could help to clarify and reduce catastrophic risks from advanced AI," conducting "analysis on threat models (ways that advanced AI could cause catastrophic harm) and technical agendas." Earlier she had worked "on estimating when transformative AI might be developed, estimating the expected returns to funding across cause areas related to global catastrophic risk, and thinking about how worldview diversification could be implemented in budget allocation."¹

Redwood Research

Redwood Research, the Berkeley alignment nonprofit announced in October 2021 with a board of Nate Thomas, Paul Christiano and Open Philanthropy's co-chief executive Holden Karnofsky, received 9.42 million dollars from Open Philanthropy in November 2021, 10.7 million in August 2022, 5.3 million in June 2023, 1.1 million in May 2025 and 36 million in November 2025.³⁴ Redwood's return for 2023 listed Cotra as a director, alongside Thomas as board chair and Buck Shlegeris as chief executive, after Christiano had left the board "thru 6/23" and Karnofsky "thru 11/23." Its return for 2024 listed her as a director "thru 8/24."³ In an April 2023 critique of Redwood posted on LessWrong under the pseudonym "Omega.", the authors quoted Cotra, identified with Open Philanthropy, among those who had endorsed Redwood at its launch, describing it as "experienced and competent at software engineering and engineering management," and wrote that "a Redwood board member is married to a different OP grantmaker."⁵

METR

METR, which began as ARC Evals inside Christiano's Alignment Research Center before spinning off in December 2023, lists Cotra among its technical staff, not among its advisers or board. It states that it does not accept funding from AI companies and does not name Open Philanthropy among its funders.²