Two key artificial intelligence (AI) researchers at Google are set to join their competitor, Anthropic, Bloomberg reported on June 24 (local time), citing internal sources.

As core personnel who led Google's AI development continue to leave for other companies, concerns are growing that Google's technological edge, built through the success of its chatbot "Gemini," could be shaken.

According to Bloomberg, Jonas Adler and Alexander Pritzel, senior researchers who played pivotal roles in the development of Gemini, are planning to move to Anthropic.

Adler worked in the field of AI coding, while Pritzel was responsible for the training area of AI systems.

Google established a dominant position in early AI research by developing the "Transformer," the foundational technology for ChatGPT, and "AlphaGo," the world's strongest Go-playing AI. However, since the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, the company fell significantly behind emerging powerhouses like OpenAI, as it remained passive in commercializing AI due to concerns that it might harm the profitability of its search engine business.

Google succeeded in a comeback after launching "Gemini 3" late last year, which outperformed competitors in reasoning and coding capabilities. However, the company has faced criticism that its status might decline again as key brains have left the company one after another recently.

The biggest blow was the recent news that John Jumper, a leading developer of the drug discovery AI "AlphaFold," is moving to Anthropic.

Jumper is an expert in AI specialized in life sciences and chemistry. In recognition of his work on AlphaFold, he was a co-recipient of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry alongside Google's AI chief Demis Hassabis and others.

Bloomberg also pointed out that star Google developer Noam Shazeer chose to move to OpenAI this month. The report noted that this string of talent departures is causing unrest among Google investors and raising questions about whether the company can continue to lead the development of advanced AI.

Due to the nature of AI technology, where a small number of differentiated capabilities easily determine the competitiveness of products and businesses, the recruitment and retention of talent are considered key factors in corporate investment decisions.

This series of departures also appears to be related to the fact that competitors OpenAI and Anthropic are both preparing for initial public offerings (IPOs).

It is known that these companies are going all-out to recruit key researchers from other firms by offering exceptional compensation and research environments to increase their investment appeal ahead of going public.

Bloomberg added that Adler and Pritzel did not respond to requests for comment regarding this report, and Anthropic declined to comment.

(Photo: Yonhap News)