Google's power struggles are killing its AI mojo

Google risks falling behind in the AI race

- PARMY OLSON

WITH THE AI race moving so rapidly, even a momentary lag can be costly. Google is learning this the hard way: The search giant rapidly caught up with OpenAI and Anthropic last year when it released Gemini 3, an AI model that surpassed key rivals on many benchmarks. Now, it’s slipping behind on AI coding. The problem isn’t Google’s technology, but a confounding tangle of red tape.

The troubles are reflected in the big names who’ve left Google’s AI division in the last few months, including research icon Noam Shazeer, who helped invent the all-important transformer (the T in ChatGPT), and John Jumper, who won the Nobel Prize for his research into protein folding. AI labs are porous, and their scientists jump between them with the frequency of fleas on cohabiting pets.