Google moves DeepMind founder Demis Hassabis to chief scientist role amid AI race

Google announced a major leadership overhaul on Wednesday, moving DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis into a chief scientist position at parent company Alphabet and appointing him chair of DeepMind, while veteran chief scientist Jeff Dean exited the firm. Hassabis, known for steering projects like AlphaFold, has expressed a focus on using AI for scientific breakthroughs such as cancer cures rather than chatbots. The change comes as Google trails competitors in AI-driven coding tools and postpones the launch of its upcoming Gemini 3.5 Pro model.

The reshuffle occurs amid a wave of departures, including Dean, Sanjay Ghemawat, Noam Shazeer and John Jumper, and follows a stock decline of up to 6 percent. Analysts view the move as formalizing an informal shift toward longer-term AI research, while external observers note the broader implications for AI safety and the approaching singularity. The realignment also sparked comments from figures like Jiang Liu, Sebastian Mallaby and former OpenAI futurist Joshua Achiam.