Demis Hassabis Steps Down as DeepMind CEO; Jeff Dean Exits Google

Google has just carried out a reorganization of its AI division, DeepMind. Demis Hassabis is stepping down as CEO of DeepMind while Chief Scientist Jeff Dean is leaving Google after 27 years to found a company.

Demis Hassabis will lead Google’s intelligence team and also serve as Chief Scientist at Alphabet, Google’s parent company. Meanwhile, Koray Kavukcuoglu, currently DeepMind’s Chief Technology Officer, will take on the role of Senior Vice President and work directly with Sundar Pichai; at the same time, Demis Hassabis will serve as the head of Google’s artificial intelligence team.

These changes happen at a time when Google is dealing with competition from OpenAI and Anthropic in the AI race. Google has already lost people in the fight, for AI talent, including Nobel winner John Jumper, who recently went to Anthropic. Information says that this has made workers feel less motivated.

The company also pushed back the release of Gemini 3.5 Pro after it reportedly did not reach its goals. After the news came out Alphabet stock dropped by four percent.

What is happening at Google DeepMind?

In a message to staff, Google CEO Sundar Pichai stated that the company had made significant progress in its AI ecosystem and noted that its products are bringing AI technology to more people than those of any other company.

Pichai added that the company needed to move faster but also needed to work on AGI (Artificial General Intelligence). “We have to accelerate all this work and stay focused on the cutting edge of AI,” Pichai wrote. “At the same time, there has never been a more important moment to shape the future of AGI and science.”

Artificial General Intelligence, a stage where AI can begin to think like human beings. With these changes, Demis Hassabis is expected to focus on AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) and how it benefits humanity “It is crucial that we get the next steps right, collectively, to ensure that all of this turns out positively for humanity and ushers in an incredible new era of discovery and wonder,” Demis wrote in his message to DeepMind employees. “Against this backdrop, I have decided that the time is right to hand over my day-to-day operational responsibilities at Google DeepMind, so that I have the time and space to focus on the big picture and contribute, as best I can, to shaping what lies ahead.”

Hassabis will keep working with Pichai on the big-picture AGI strategy. That part of his role isn’t changing. He’s also staying on as CEO of Isomorphic Labs. That’s Alphabet’s drug discovery spinout.

Jeff Dean Leaves Google

Jeff Dean, Google’s Chief Scientist, is leaving the company after 27 years. During his time at Google, he notes, the company grew “from 25 people to over 190,000.” He is now launching Discovery Loop, an independent public benefit corporation in which Google will participate as an investor and cloud service provider. Joining him are Sanjay Ghemawat (Google Distinguished Scientist), Oriol Vinyals (VP at DeepMind), and Quoc Le (co-founder of Google Brain). The departure of these four key members is expected to deal a significant blow to Google.

Dean says that Discovery Loop wants to make machine learning and science easier with automation. This will help us make discoveries and move forward with machine learning and science. There are reports that Pichai had meetings with the group to try to get them to stay. They decided to leave and start their own company instead. Discovery Loop is, about machine learning and Oriol Vinyals think that starting a new company is more fun and gives them more freedom to work on machine learning.

Establishing a public benefit corporation will likely allow the four founders to continue working without having to prioritize financial profits. “We could make decisions that don’t necessarily align with the company’s strictest financial interests,” Dean told a famous publication.

New Head for Google DeepMind

Koray Kavukcuoglu will take charge of the next phase of Google DeepMind, overseeing the development of the Gemini model, cutting-edge AI research, and the teams responsible for the Gemini application and third-party development.

“For Google DeepMind, our mission to develop AI responsibly for the benefit of humanity remains unchanged. My priority is ensuring we have the clearest possible path to deliver on our ambitious Gemini roadmap as we advance toward AGI [Artificial General Intelligence],” Koray stated. “In today’s rapidly evolving landscape, we must act with absolute determination and agility.” Koray Kavukcuoglu has been working with Demis Hassabis for over 13 years. Following these changes, Demis stated that the Gemini models were in good hands with Koray at the helm.