Thinking Machines Lab co-founder Barret Zoph joins Google

Barret Zoph, co-founder of AI startup Thinking Machines Lab, is set to join Google DeepMind as Vice President of Research, according to Zoph's statement on Wednesday. Prior to his current role, Zoph served as Vice President of Research at OpenAI. Notably, Zoph made a brief return to OpenAI after leaving Thinking Machines earlier this year, as indicated on his LinkedIn profile.

This move represents a series of AI-driven changes at Google, including DeepMind CEO Dennis Hassabis stepping down recently. Zoph spent six years at Google as a research scientist in Google Brain, which later merged with DeepMind to form Google DeepMind in 2023. Earlier this month, an all-hands meeting at Alphabet revealed that some teams were moving out of DeepMind and into corporate Google, according to Reuters citing two sources.