Google and Alphabet have announced a major leadership restructuring within Google DeepMind, appointing Demis Hassabis as Chair of Google DeepMind and Chief Scientist of Alphabet, while promoting Koray Kavukcuoglu to Senior Vice President of Google DeepMind as the company accelerates its artificial intelligence ambitions.
In a message to employees, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said the changes are designed to strengthen the company's leadership as it advances its AI roadmap and pursues breakthroughs in artificial general intelligence (AGI) and scientific discovery.
Pichai highlighted Google's strong AI momentum, noting that the company's Gemini models continue to see growing adoption among developers and enterprises, while the Gemini app has surpassed 950 million monthly users. He also pointed to recent advances across Google's AI portfolio, including progress in robotics, cybersecurity and open-source AI models.
Under the new structure, Hassabis will focus on shaping Alphabet's long-term AGI and scientific research agenda while continuing to lead Isomorphic Labs. He will remain closely involved with Google DeepMind's research teams, providing strategic guidance across frontier AI models and scientific initiatives.
Pichai described the appointment as a natural evolution of Hassabis' role, stating that his expertise will be critical in helping Alphabet navigate what he called one of the most important periods in the development of artificial intelligence.
Koray Kavukcuoglu, currently Google DeepMind's Chief Technology Officer and Chief AI Architect, will now oversee Gemini model development, frontier AI research, the Gemini application, and developer-focused AI initiatives. Reporting directly to Pichai, Kavukcuoglu will lead Google DeepMind's next phase of AI innovation.
A long-time DeepMind executive, Kavukcuoglu has spent more than 13 years with the organisation, where he established its deep learning team and led pioneering research behind technologies including Deep Q-Networks (DQN) and WaveNet, which have significantly influenced modern AI systems.
The announcement also marks the departure of veteran Google executive Jeff Dean, who is leaving after 27 years at the company. Dean, alongside Google Senior Fellow Sanjay Ghemawat, will establish an independent public benefit corporation focused on accelerating research in machine learning, science and engineering. Alphabet will remain a founding investor and strategic cloud partner while continuing research collaborations with the new venture.
The leadership changes underscore Google's commitment to strengthening its position at the forefront of AI development as competition intensifies in foundation models, agentic AI and AGI research. By separating long-term scientific leadership from day-to-day product execution, Alphabet aims to accelerate innovation while maintaining its focus on responsible AI development and scientific breakthroughs.
