So Google, Meta, and Microsoft will just hollow out the best AI startups of their talent instead of buying them - out of fear of monopoly lawsuits I'm assuming?
Nice plan I guess. Kind of obvious to spot though.
It's unclear if OpenAI cancelled the deal, or Google poached them? Either way, this season of "OpenAI Drama" is wild. First Meta, now Google. Your turn Amazon / Microsoft.
> OpenAI’s deal to buy Windsurf is off, and Google will instead hire Windsurf CEO Varun Mohan, cofounder Douglas Chen, and some of Windsurf’s R&D employees and bring them onto the Google DeepMind team, Google and Windsurf announced Friday.
> Mohan and the Windsurf employees will focus on agentic coding efforts at Google DeepMind and work largely on Gemini. Google will not have any control over nor a stake in Windsurf, but it will take a non-exclusive license to some of Windsurf’s technology.
Sounds to me like they're "hiring" them like one "hires" a consultant?
I did not see this coming. Wow. The game of thrones in SV.
I wonder what happened with the OpenAI deal. Anyone have any guesses? My first guess is "Look at Claude Code, we can do this ourselves." But, I am likely thinking too simply.
edit: does this mean that Windsurf and its users will stop being iced-out by Anthropic? Or, is this the end of Windsurf?
It's another Character.ai situation [0]. Unfortunate for any employees who aren't founders or researchers, as they don't get any payout or a nice new job from this exit structure. In fact they lose their whole time invested at the company.
What a harsh time to work for an AI startup as a rank and file employee! I wonder how the founders justify going along with it inside their mind.
Edit: Thank you @jonny_eh for the clarification. I can't imagine it feels awesome being a leftover but at least you vested out. "Take the money and leave" is still a bit raw when the founders and researchers are now getting the initial payout + generous Google RSU's.
I never knew anyone who used Windsurf. These AI acquisitions have been unbelievable(in a bad way). WIX acquired some garbage Lovable.dev clone for 80 million. I think many of us are waiting for this bubble to pop(economy will likely pop too)
Windsurf was also used by enterprises because of their on-prem plan. They gutted that after OpenAI acquisition was announced and since then I am sure none of those enterprises that used it will switch to their cloud offering and look for other venues.
I used it for about six weeks in the spring, at which point I tried cursor and found out that it was far better for my use case (backend Go): better and faster autocomplete that can work across files, less buggy UI, and it actually follows your rules.
I’m not bothered by this news — it’d be pretty shortsighted to assume that any of these disposable AI assistants will continue to exist forever.
I wonder if this is a result of the previously reported clashes between OpenAI and Microsoft over access to the Windsurf IP (under their investment agreement)
For the love of God, can we get a reboot of the Silicon Valley television show? Just on AI. Like when they wrapped it, they wrapped it on AI usage. So, it's got the perfect arc for a reboot that focuses perfectly on AI.
I don't know anyone who heard or used Windsurf outside the Bay Area. Even Cursor feels very Bay Area bubbly (although that is the market to go after if you're in ai dev tools).
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 86.1 ms ] threadNice plan I guess. Kind of obvious to spot though.
> Mohan and the Windsurf employees will focus on agentic coding efforts at Google DeepMind and work largely on Gemini. Google will not have any control over nor a stake in Windsurf, but it will take a non-exclusive license to some of Windsurf’s technology.
Sounds to me like they're "hiring" them like one "hires" a consultant?
I wonder what happened with the OpenAI deal. Anyone have any guesses? My first guess is "Look at Claude Code, we can do this ourselves." But, I am likely thinking too simply.
edit: does this mean that Windsurf and its users will stop being iced-out by Anthropic? Or, is this the end of Windsurf?
What a harsh time to work for an AI startup as a rank and file employee! I wonder how the founders justify going along with it inside their mind.
[0] Character.ai CEO Noam Shazeer Returns to Google https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41141112 - 11 months ago (87 comments)
Edit: Thank you @jonny_eh for the clarification. I can't imagine it feels awesome being a leftover but at least you vested out. "Take the money and leave" is still a bit raw when the founders and researchers are now getting the initial payout + generous Google RSU's.
I’m not bothered by this news — it’d be pretty shortsighted to assume that any of these disposable AI assistants will continue to exist forever.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44262383