Google Reshuffles AI Leadership as Koray Kavukcuoglu Takes Control of DeepMind

Alphabet has handed day-to-day leadership of Google DeepMind to Koray Kavukcuoglu as Demis Hassabis moves into a newly created role as Alphabet chief scientist and becomes chairman of the AI unit.

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Kavukcuoglu, previously DeepMind’s chief technology officer, will lead Google DeepMind as senior vice president while retaining his position as Alphabet’s chief AI architect. He reports directly to Google CEO Sundar Pichai.

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The August 5 leadership change puts an executive already closely involved in Gemini development at the center of Google’s AI operations. Kavukcuoglu had taken oversight of model development more than a year earlier.

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Kavukcuoglu Takes a Larger Operating Role

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Kavukcuoglu joined DeepMind in 2012 and rose through its technical leadership ranks before becoming CTO. His responsibilities expanded again in 2025 when Google CEO Sundar Pichai appointed him chief AI architect, giving him responsibility for bringing Gemini into products across the company.

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His authority now extends across DeepMind as Alphabet works to accelerate Gemini development. Google delayed the next flagship version of Gemini after internal testing showed weaknesses in areas including coding. Sergey Brin has also become more involved in AI development, pushing teams to move faster on Gemini.

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Hassabis Moves Toward Research and AGI

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Hassabis will give up most of his management responsibilities after leading DeepMind since co-founding the company in 2010.

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As Alphabet chief scientist, he will focus on artificial general intelligence research and the societal implications of capable AI systems. He will also spend more time with Isomorphic Labs, the AI drug discovery company spun out of DeepMind, where he remains CEO.

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Hassabis continued running DeepMind after Google acquired the London company in 2014 for roughly $650 million. In 2023, Google combined DeepMind with Google Brain and placed Hassabis in charge of the combined organization.

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His new position creates a clearer separation between long-range scientific work and the operating leadership responsible for Gemini.

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Senior AI Leaders Leave Google

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The reshuffle coincided with the departure of several longtime Google AI executives.

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Jeff Dean, chief scientist of Google DeepMind, left the company alongside Sanjay Ghemawat, Oriol Vinyals and Quoc Le to form Discovery Loop, a public benefit corporation focused on machine learning and scientific research.

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Dean had spent years as one of Google’s most senior technical executives and became chief scientist of Google DeepMind when Google Brain and DeepMind combined in 2023. Vinyals had also served as one of Gemini’s original technical co-leads.

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Their departures remove several prominent researchers from Google at the same time Kavukcuoglu gains greater authority over the company’s AI program.

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The new structure gives Kavukcuoglu authority over Gemini development and DeepMind operations, while his chief AI architect role connects that work to products across Alphabet. Kavukcuoglu now sits directly beneath Pichai while holding authority across one of Alphabet’s most closely watched businesses.

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What the Reshuffle Says About Google's AI Leadership Structure

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Kavukcuoglu's promotion follows more than a year of expanding responsibility. Google first gave him authority beyond DeepMind through the chief AI architect role, connecting his work more closely with product teams before handing him day-to-day control of the AI unit.

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The new structure separates two things that sat under one person before. Scientific work and long-term AGI research move with Hassabis. Kavukcuoglu takes the organization building Gemini and getting it into products.

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For companies building their own AI leadership teams, Google's structure raises a question for the executive level: how much authority should the executive responsible for AI development also hold over deployment across the business?