Promising Partnership or Perilous Pairing?

Barely a month ago, AIM told you why DeepMind and Google Brain must bury the hatchet and join forces. The article highlighted the potential benefits of this collaboration, and we stand by our claim that together, the duo would be a force to reckon with. And there it was! Last week, Sundar Pichai announced the merger of Google Brain, Google’s AI research team, with Deepmind, an artificial intelligence research laboratory that served as a subsidiary of Google. The new unit will be called Google DeepMind. 

Pichai announced that Demis Hassabis (previously CEO of DeepMind) “will lead the development of most capable and responsible general AI systems” as the CEO of Google DeepMind. On the other hand, Hassabis boldly proclaimed on his blog that AI, and ultimately AGI, could catalyse one of the most monumental societal, financial, and scientific upheavals in human history. And he chose Google DeepMind to expedite this process. 

Google optimises spending

The move is more aligned with Google’s attempt to make its position stronger in the losing battle against OpenAI and Microsoft. The tech giant already arrived late with Bard, while ChatGPT became the household name for AI. Microsoft dealt another blow by integrating GPT 4 into Bing. If that was not enough, now Elon Musk is on a buying spree for GPUs. The SpaceX founder has launched X.AI, which is touted to be a rival of OpenAI. Musk has said he’s working on TruthGPT, a ChatGPT alternative that acts as a “maximum truth-seeking AI”. 

At this point, Google too wanted to optimise spending. The company has spent tons on multiple projects but keeps losing out to other big tech companies. While Google has the best of resources and top-notch engineering, experts feel that the company may have gotten a tad comfortable after monopolising search. 

Google also had reportedly pulled the plug on the prolonged negotiations with DeepMind, effectively quashing their plea for greater independence. Insiders suggest that DeepMind had floated the idea of obtaining nonprofit status as a possible solution, but the talks were called off "late last month”, as communicated by DeepMind to its staff. Apparently, the maverick minds behind DeepMind had pitched the idea of converting the company into a nonprofit, arguing that a robust AI like theirs shouldn't be shackled to a single corporate entity. However, Google was purportedly unreceptive to this proposal, citing the substantial investment it had poured into DeepMind.

In addition to this, a recent report by The Information indicates that Google Brain engineers have already been collaborating with DeepMind experts on Gemini, a generative AI software that aims to compete with OpenAI. Google's acquisition of DeepMind included a highly-publicised commitment to establish an ethics board to ensure that its technology was deployed in a fair and ethical manner. However, the specifics of this board, including its composition and responsibilities, have always been somewhat ambiguous. 

Regrettably, Google's recent actions suggest that it may no longer be prioritising ethical considerations in the development of AI. Additionally, as DeepMind loses its autonomy within Google, there may be less emphasis on research collaboration between the two teams. In 2021, DeepMind reportedly lost its years-long bid to gain more independence from Google as the tech giant began pushing DeepMind toward commercialising its work. However, as Google dives further into the AI industry, it likely wants to combine its research teams to bolster its efforts.

A 2019 report from The Economist said the board even held ownership over any artificial general intelligence created by DeepMind — a term that refers to AI that meets or exceeds human capacity across a broad range of tasks.

Although Alphabet's AI dominance is good news, we can expect more exciting Google products in the near future. However, according to Alphabet's fourth-quarter earnings report in February, DeepMind will now solely concentrate on product development. The report indicated that starting this year, DeepMind's incorporation into other businesses would be reflected in Alphabet's corporate costs.