Alphabet shares fell after Google confirmed that chief scientist Jeff Dean is leaving after 27 years to start his own machine-learning company. Demis Hassabis and Koray Kavukcuoglu are taking over his responsibilities as part of a shakeup at Google's AI division.
Alphabet shares fell about 4% shortly after Google announced that Jeff Dean, its chief scientist, is leaving the company. Dean joined Google as its 30th employee in 1999 and became one of the architects of its AI strategy.
Dean is leaving to launch Discovery Loop, a public-benefit corporation focused on machine learning. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Dean and his Discovery Loop co-founders — also Google veterans — said they needed to leave to pursue their research interests. Dean said on X that the group aims to automate machine learning, science, and engineering to accelerate discoveries and progress.
Hassabis and Kavukcuoglu step into Dean's role
Demis Hassabis, who is stepping down as chief executive of DeepMind, will replace Dean; his new title will be chair of Google DeepMind. Koray Kavukcuoglu, Google's chief AI architect, will oversee frontier AI research and the Gemini models. Hassabis said the move gives him time and space to focus on the big picture around AI and artificial general intelligence, and that he plans to focus on Isomorphic Labs, the AI drug-discovery spinoff Google established in 2021.
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in the company's blog post that Alphabet is a founding investor in Discovery Loop, as well as a cloud partner. In the same statement, Hassabis said: "We have all the ingredients to lead from here, and I firmly believe we will."
A pattern of AI departures
Dean's exit follows two other high-profile departures announced in June. Noam Shazeer, co-lead of Gemini, left for OpenAI. John Jumper, a Nobel Prize winner, moved to Anthropic.
The reshuffle comes as delays to Gemini models and higher AI spending have pressured Alphabet's stock. Shares fell 7% after the company's late-July earnings report, which showed heightened spending.
Source: MarketWatch
Trading involves risk.
Risk Disclaimer
