Google squashes AI teams together in push for fresh models

Google is consolidating the various teams working on generative AI under the DeepMind team in a bid to accelerate development of more capable systems.

The decision, handed down by CEO Sundar Pichai on Thursday, builds on previous consolidation efforts around AI development at the Chocolate Factory. Last year, the search giant combined its DeepMind team and its Brain division to form a group confusingly called Google DeepMind. This team was ultimately responsible for training the models behind Google's Gemini chatbot.

"All of this work will now sit in Google DeepMind and scale our capacity to deliver capable AI for users, partners and customers," he wrote, adding that the change will allow Google Research to focus more of its attention on investigating foundational and applied computer science.

Google's so-called Responsible AI team is also joining the DeepMind crew, where it's expected to play a larger role earlier in the development of new models. Google says it already moved other responsibility groups under its central Trust and Safety team and plans to build out more extensive AI testing and evaluation protocols.

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