Microsoft has named Mustafa Suleyman, the co-founder of the British artificial intelligence lab DeepMind, as the head of its new AI division.
Suleyman, aged 39, co-founded DeepMind alongside Demis Hassabis and Shane Legg in 2010. The company was later acquired by Google for £400 million in 2014, subsequently becoming a central part of Google’s AI endeavors following a merger with another unit in 2023.
Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, announced in a blog post that Suleyman, a British AI pioneer who departed Google in 2022, would lead the newly formed Microsoft AI organization, focusing on the company’s consumer products and research. Several employees from Suleyman’s Inflection AI startup will also join the division.
Microsoft has made significant strides in generative AI, thanks to its substantial investment in OpenAI, the developer of the ChatGPT chatbot.
Nadella commented, “I’ve known Mustafa for several years and have greatly admired him as a founder of both DeepMind and Inflection, and as a visionary, product maker, and builder of pioneering teams that go after bold missions.”
The new division consolidates Microsoft’s consumer AI efforts, including its Copilot chatbot and the recently launched Bing browser, which utilizes technology akin to ChatGPT. Copilot, a central focus of Microsoft’s AI revenue generation efforts, is capable of writing emails, summarizing documents, and creating presentations.
“This infusion of new talent will enable us to accelerate our pace yet again,” Nadella added.
Karen Simonyan, co-founder of Inflection AI alongside Suleyman and Microsoft board member Reid Hoffman, will join the new unit as chief scientist.
Meanwhile, Google is also expanding its AI-related initiatives, with reports indicating talks with Apple to integrate Google’s Gemini AI product into the iPhone.
Inflection AI has emerged as a prominent player in the generative AI race, securing a $1.3 billion investment from Microsoft and chipmaker Nvidia last June, valuing the company at $4 billion.
Suleyman, born in north London to a Syrian father and English mother, recently authored a book on AI titled “The Coming Wave,” which explores the technology’s potential benefits while warning of potential threats to global order. He advocates for a significant increase in the number of researchers focusing on AI safety.
In a previous interview with the Guardian, Suleyman described the book as a “provocation,” expressing confidence in his predictions while emphasizing the importance of intervention.