Koray Kavukcuoglu, a 13-year DeepMind veteran who helped build some of the foundational technologies powering modern AI, was promoted to Senior Vice President of Google DeepMind on August 5. The reshuffle and what it meansKavukcuoglu now oversees Google’s Gemini model development and core AI research teams, reporting directly to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai. Demis Hassabis, co-founder and former CEO of Google DeepMind, shifted into a more strategic position as Chair of Google DeepMind and Chief Scientist for Alphabet. The restructuring aligns with what Pichai has described as a new phase of AI platform development for Google. The succession question nobody is officially askingPichai has led Google since 2015 and Alphabet since 2019.