{"slug": "google-ai-leader-leaves-demis-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves", "title": "Google AI leader leaves, Demis Hassabis to be chair in seismic moves", "summary": "Alphabet Inc.'s Google is losing prominent AI veterans in a major leadership overhaul, with shares falling as much as 5.5%. Demis Hassabis, head of Google DeepMind, will become chairman, while Jeff Dean is departing to launch a startup, taking several employees with him. Koray Kavukcuoglu, Google's Chief AI Architect, will take over many of Hassabis's responsibilities as senior vice president, reporting to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai.", "body_md": "**Getting your**\n\n[Trinity Audio](//trinityaudio.ai)player ready...**By Shirin Ghaffary and Mark Bergen, Bloomberg**\n\nAlphabet Inc.’s [Google](/tag/google/) is losing some of its most prominent AI veterans in a seismic overhaul that is casting doubt over leadership of a critical area of growth right as competition intensifies. Alphabet shares fell as much as 5.5% on the news.\n\nDemis Hassabis, the head of Google DeepMind, is moving to a chairman role at the lab. Jeff Dean, a longtime Google employee central to the development of its AI strategy, is meanwhile departing the company to launch a startup, taking several high-profile employees with him.\n\nKoray Kavukcuoglu, Google’s Chief AI Architect and a longtime Hassabis deputy, will be taking over many of Hassabis’s responsibilities as senior vice president and report to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, the company announced on Wednesday in a blog post.\n\nHassabis co-founded DeepMind, a pioneering artificial intelligence research lab that sold to Google in 2014. He has since become a leading figure in the development of AI technology.\n\n“I’ve decided that now is the right time for me to hand over my day-to-day operational responsibilities at GDM, so that I have the time and space to focus on the big picture and help influence what is to come to the best of my ability,” Hassabis said in a statement.\n\nShares of Alphabet were trading at $362.31 at 12:08 p.m. in New York.\n\nMore stories like this are available on [bloomberg.com](https://www.bloomberg.com)\n\n©2026 Bloomberg L.P.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-ai-leader-leaves-demis-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves", "canonical_source": "https://www.mercurynews.com/2026/08/05/google-ai-leader-leaves-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves/", "published_at": "2026-08-05 17:57:59+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-05 18:25:17.288009+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-research"], "entities": ["Alphabet Inc.", "Google", "Demis Hassabis", "Jeff Dean", "Koray Kavukcuoglu", "Sundar Pichai", "Google DeepMind"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-ai-leader-leaves-demis-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-ai-leader-leaves-demis-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-ai-leader-leaves-demis-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-ai-leader-leaves-demis-hassabis-to-be-chair-in-seismic-moves.jsonld"}}