OpenAI’s deal to amass the viral AI coding startup Windsurf fell aside on Friday, in line with The Verge.
In a surprising twist, Google DeepMind is now hiring Windsurf CEO Varun Mohan, co-founder Douglas Chen, and among the startup’s high AI coding expertise. A Google spokesperson confirmed the hiring of Windsurf’s leaders in an announcement to TechCrunch.
“We’re excited to welcome some high AI coding expertise from Windsurf’s crew to Google DeepMind to advance our work in agentic coding,” stated Google spokesperson Chris Pappas in an electronic mail to TechCrunch.
Notably, Google will not be taking a stake in Windsurf and won’t have any management over the corporate. Nevertheless, as a part of the deal, Google could have a nonexclusive license to sure Windsurf expertise, although the AI coding startup stays free to license its expertise to others.
The deal represents the AI ecosystem’s newest reverse-acquihire, by which an organization acquires a startup’s high expertise and licenses its expertise however doesn’t outright purchase the corporate. Google beforehand performed an analogous deal to rent again Character.AI CEO Noam Shazeer, as did Microsoft to rent Mustafa Suleyman. These offers have helped a number of large tech corporations enhance their place within the AI race with out drawing regulatory scrutiny.
“We’re excited to be becoming a member of Google DeepMind together with among the Windsurf crew,” stated Mohan and Chen in an announcement to TechCrunch. “We’re happy with what Windsurf has constructed over the past 4 years and are excited to see it transfer ahead with their world class crew and kick-start the following part.”
As of Friday, Windsurf’s head of enterprise, Jeff Wang, will take over because the startup’s interim CEO, he introduced in a put up on social media. Most of Windsurf’s 250 individual crew will not be headed to Google DeepMind and can proceed providing its AI coding instruments for enterprise clients.
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