TechnologyAugust 6, 2026

Big Changes at Google's AI Labs

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② Start Lesson

Key Vocabulary

chair/tʃeər/

a person who leads a group or organization

"She is the chair of the research team."

researcher/rɪˈsɜːr.tʃər/

someone who studies a subject to find facts

"The researcher wrote a report about the experiment."

startup/ˈstɑːrt.ʌp/

a new small company that has just started

"They joined a tech startup in the city."

Listening

Big Changes at Google's AI Labs

Google changed its AI leadership on August 5, 2026. Demis Hassabis, a British scientist who won the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for work on protein prediction, left his day-to-day CEO job and became chair of Google DeepMind and chief scientist of Alphabet.

At the same time, several top AI researchers left Google to start a new company called Discovery Loop. Koray Kavukcuoglu will run Google DeepMind day to day. The news also said Google will invest in the new startup and support it with cloud services.

87 words

Quiz

1. Who moved to a new role?

2. What is the new company started by top researchers?

3. Who will run Google DeepMind day to day?

Reading Practice

Read the article from the Listening section aloud. Your AI teacher will give you pronunciation feedback.

Discussion

Do you follow news about new technology companies? Why or why not?

Have you ever worked with a small team or startup? What was it like?

What do you think about a leader focusing on research instead of daily tasks?