A female tech exec who was sacked by an AI ‘tech bro’ firm after she fell asleep in the sauna on a boozy work trip is seeking a massive £76million payout.
Shannon Burns could receive the record sum after she won a disability discrimination case against Gitpod – a company now owned by ChatGPT developers OpenAI – in 2025.
The ‘trailblazing’ executive was headhunted for the software company and offered the six-figure salary and access to an equity package potentially worth more than £30million, but said she soon realised the company was ‘male dominated’ and filled with ‘tech bros’.
Ms Burns was appointed as Gitpod’s Vice President of Engineering in late 2022 but, less than a year later, she was sacked after she had to resort to sleeping in a sauna during a work trip to Lofer in Austria.
Despite winning her case against the company, the American executive – who says she has developed PTSD after her sacking and has had to leave a career in tech for good – is still fighting to receive compensation.
She claims that Gitpod have been using ‘aggressive litigation tactics to drag out the process and wear her down’.
The former tech exec is seeking £76million based on ‘forensic’ calculations of what she could have earned in the highly-lucrative industry.
The firm’s 53-strong workforce all work remotely across 22 countries and 14 time zones, but Ms Burns and two other members of staff were based in the UK and were working from home on UK contracts when she was dismissed.
Gitpod attempted to restrict the amount she could seek to £1million using a legal application described as ‘oppressive’ by her lawyers.
Shannon Burns (pictured) could be in line for the record sum of cash after she won a disability discrimination case against Gitpod – a company now owned by ChatGPT developers OpenAI – in 2025
Ms Burns, pictured here with previous Mail coverage of her case, was sacked after she had to resort to sleeping in a sauna during a work trip to Lofer in Austria
However, Birmingham Employment Tribunal has dismissed their application, meaning she can now formally seek £76,071,992 compensation.
Gitpod has also been ordered to disclose to Ms Burns what the recent sale of the company to OpenAI was worth.
The company did not tell Ms Burns how much it was sold to OpenAI for even though she has shares in the firm, which are thought to be worth £2.6million alone and could rise to £21million after four years.
Currently, the biggest known award in UK Employment Tribunal history is £4.58million.
Ms Burns was seen as a ‘trailblazer’ in the tech industry who worked for Silicon Valley firms including Slack and Lyft.
She was headhunted by Gitpod in late 2022 and appointed to the key leadership role of Vice President of Engineering on a £220,000 salary with a £78,000 annual bonus.
Ms Burns – who has ADHD – went on an off-site team-building event in Lofer, Austria, in April 2023.
CEO Johannes Landgraf and other staff drank alcohol during the trip and one evening Ms Burns, who had also been drinking, could not access her room because she had forgotten her key.
CEO Johannes Landgraf (pictured) said he was concerned about Ms Burns’ ‘lack of professional accountability’ after she slept in the sauna
Her medical condition caused her to have a ‘great deal of forgetfulness’ and she would ‘persistently’ lose items.
That night she ended up having to sleep in a sauna and after the trip CEO Mr Landgraf said he was concerned about her ‘lack of professional accountability’.
In June 2023, she was sacked, with Ms Burns saying ‘My male colleagues were drinking alcohol/drunk at the offsite but I was the only one who was dismissed.’
Last year Birmingham Employment Tribunal found that Ms Burns was dismissed as a result of her ADHD and she won a disability discrimination case.
Ms Burns seeks £76million and relies on calculations made in her ‘schedule of loss’ – which examines what she could have gone on to earn.
Because she earned such a huge salary and the tech industry is so lucrative, it is estimated that her total future losses are over £59million.
The remainder of the £76million is made up of sums to cover injury to feelings and what is known as an ACAS Uplift.
At the latest Birmingham hearing, Gitpod applied to have her £76million schedule of loss capped at £1million.
Gitpod applied for the judge to enforce a ‘deposit order’ of £1,000 and as part of the order find that any claim worth more than £1million has ‘little reasonable prospect of success’.
The case was heard at the West Midlands Tribunal Centre in Birmingham (pictured)
In its application, Gitpod argued that Ms Burns’s claim for over £76million was ‘extraordinary’, adding: ‘The arguments set out in the [schedule of loss] are palpable nonsense.’
Gitpod added: ‘[Gitpod] seeks an order that [Ms Burns] be ordered to pay a deposit of £1,000 to continue her claim for losses in excess of £1 million.’
Employment Judge Rachel Wedderspoon dismissed the application.
Judge Wedderspoon said: ‘[Ms Burns] has an exceptionally high pay history…. Her case is that but for the treatment she suffered at the hands of [Gitpod] she would have continued to have a highly lucrative career.
‘[Her] schedule of loss is based on past and future predicted loss and she has included the amount for loss of salary but also loss of equity because if she had continued her career in this sector part of remuneration would have consisted of equity.’
Judge Wedderspoon said OpenAI has acquired Gitpod for a sum believed to be $400 million (£302 million).
The judge said since Ms Burns had 0.85 per cent shares in Gitpod, her shares could be worth $3.4 million (£2.6 million) now and $27.85 million (£21 million) in four years if the $400 million acquisition fee is true.
Judge Wedderspoon concluded: ‘The Tribunal finds that an award in the sum claimed by [Ms Burns] is highly unusual and the sort of award that may be more commonplace awarded in the US jurisdiction.
‘However, the Tribunal cannot say at a summary assessment in the absence of an employment remuneration expert report or an expert medical information that [her] valuation has little reasonable prospect of success.’
Tara Grossman, an employment lawyer assisting Ms Burns, described the outcome of the hearing as a ‘resounding success’.
She said: ‘Shannon’s £76 million schedule of loss is a forensic calculation of what she could very well have earned if she had not been dismissed by Gitpod due to her disabilities.
‘She was working in tech which is probably the most lucrative career of our time.
‘She had already earned well over a £1 million in junior roles and when she joined Gitpod she was given a £220,000 annual salary and told her shares could be worth anywhere from $1.06 million to $27.85 million.’
Ms Grossman added that she believes Gitpod is trying to use ‘aggressive litigation tactics to drag out the process and wear [Ms Burns] down’.
A full compensation hearing will be held at a later date, pending Gitpod’s appeal of the previous tribunal ruling.
