Twitter/X

Google has "effectively thrown in the towel" on combining AI model efforts with…

2026-08-07 · 16:37 UTC ·@cryptopunk7213 ·2 min read

Brief

@cryptopunk7213 argues Google has suffered a major setback: top AI talent (Jeff Dean, Sanjay, Noam Shazeer → OpenAI, Jumper → Anthropic) has left, DeepMind is described as "no longer a frontier lab," and compute/political failures — including reportedly selling >20% of TPUs (3Q26–4Q27) to Anthropic and withholding an internal ChatGPT over search-margin fears — have crippled its ability to deploy models effectively.

Why it matters

Google has "effectively thrown in the towel" on combining AI model efforts with being a cloud provider + investment fund; top engineers have departed — Jeff (Dean) and Sanjay left, Noam Shazeer is at OpenAI, and Jumper is at Anthropic.

Key details

  • SemiAnalysis asserts DeepMind is "no longer a frontier lab" due to mass departures from reinforcement-learning teams and poor compute allocation; reportedly more than 20% of TPU shipments from 3Q26–4Q27 were sold directly to Anthropic.
  • Google reportedly had an internal ChatGPT nearly a year before OpenAI released ChatGPT but withheld it over fears it would eat search margins; the author says internal politics and stressed TPU allocation must be aggressively reformed to regain SOTA potential.
Source evidence

having thought more about the google situation, it's hard not to view the recent fallout as a major blow:

  • google's effectively thrown in the towel on ai model efforts to become a cloud provider + investment fund

  • their star players have all left. jeff and sanjay were their top engineers, noam shazeer is at openai, jumper is at anthropic.

  • this is a cultural issue. google has all of the capital it needs to be competitive but the challenge is organising talent to work together

  • its clear from their allocation of tpus and reported in-fighting to secure compute that its putting stress on top talent.

"oh but they invested in top labs and have capital to catch up and have distribution!"

yes but that means nothing if you don't deploy it effectively. remember google had a internal version of chatgpt almost a year before openai released chatgpt....

they didn't release it because they were worried it would eat their search margins.

im not saying google is out for the count but its clear they need to aggressively shift internal politics to get back into a winning position.

tae kim (@firstadopter)

YUP!

SemiAnalysis: "For all intents and purposes, we believe DeepMind is no longer a frontier lab."

"due to large numbers of departures from their reinforcement learning teams and poor compute allocation. Google will continue meandering on and releasing models, but their odds of reaching SOTA again have dropped to zero."

"Google is now simply unable to retain top AI talent."

"Obviously these are not the actions of people excited about Gemini 4 Pro."

"Jeff, Sanjay, Quoc, and Oriol are just the latest in a long string of high profile departures from DeepMind."

"Jeff [Dean] is the undisputed GOAT of Google engineering, co-founded Google Brain, and started the TPU program."

"Google, on the other hand, decided it was totally worth it to sell enormous amounts of compute to Gemini’s fiercest competitors on long term contracts without any hope of ever returning it to DeepMind."

"More than 20% of total TPU shipments from 3Q26 to 4Q27 are being sold directly to Anthropic."

"The issue with Google was not Jeff Dean nor Noam Shazeer, but rather their extremely bureaucratic, painfully slow, and strategically timid culture."

"Google will join the ranks of other legendary tech giants like IBM and Intel to give up on the harder thing and do the thing that will make you more money."

"it becomes demoralizing as many of the great technology leads have left."

— https://nitter.net/firstadopter/status/2085586085208375694#m