Changes at Google DeepMind: Demis Hassabis from CEO to Chair, Jeff Dean departs(blog.google)
849 points by colesantiago 69 days ago | 922 comments
tl;dr: Demis Hassabis is stepping back from day-to-day operations at Google DeepMind to become Chair of GDM and Chief Scientist of Alphabet, focusing on AGI strategy and his role at Isomorphic Labs. Koray Kavukcuoglu, previously CTO of GDM, will take over as SVP of Google DeepMind, overseeing Gemini development and frontier research. Separately, Jeff Dean is leaving Google after 27 years to launch an independent public benefit corporation with Sanjay Ghemawat focused on ML and science research, with Google as a founding investor.
HN Discussion:
  • ↑Google is hemorrhaging top AI talent while gaining none, signaling a toxic environment
  • ~Jeff and Sanjay's departure is the real bombshell, far more significant than Demis's role change
  • ↑DeepMind's decline stems from being forced to pivot from pure research to commercial competition
  • •Google's stock-based compensation can't compete with startup upside, driving talent to OpenAI/Anthropic
  • ↑This marks the end of a golden era at Google, with senior engineers losing their last reason to stay