Barret Zoph, the Thinking Machines co-founder ousted before joining OpenAI, is now at Google
In Brief Posted: 12:52 PM PDT · August 27, 2026 Image Credits:Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto / Getty Images Lucas Ropek Barret Zoph, the Thinking Machines co-founder ousted before joining OpenAI, is now at Google The game of musical chairs for AI executives continues. Barret Zoph, a co-founder of the AI…
In Brief Posted: 12:52 PM PDT · August 27, 2026 Image Credits:Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto / Getty Images Lucas Ropek Barret Zoph, the Thinking Machines co-founder ousted before joining OpenAI, is now at Google The game of musical chairs for AI executives continues. Barret Zoph, a co-founder of the AI startup Thinking Machines who left the company earlier this year to rejoin OpenAI, has found yet another job. Zoph spent two years at OpenAI and left in October 2024 to co-found Thinking Machines with Mira Murati, who had left the AI lab the month prior. In January, Zoph and another Thinking Machines co-founder, Luke Metz, quite dramatically departed from the startup to return to OpenAI. It was later revealed that Zoph had been fired. His return didn’t quite stick. Zoph spent only five months at OpenAI, where he was tasked with heading AI enterprise sales. He left the company in June. And now we know where he landed. Zoph has taken a position as vice president of research at Google (which happens to be another company where he previously worked). “We look forward to Barret returning to Google and bringing his RL and post-training expertise to Gemini,” a Google spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal. TechCrunch reached out to OpenAI and Google for more information. It’s not always easy to divine why tech executives seem to be spending less time in their roles. The turnover rate in the AI industry is high, and it’s been especially high at OpenAI — a company that, despite readying itself for an IPO and being one of the most powerful presences in the tech world, has lost a lot of critical staff over the last eight months. The turnover of high-level executives — from the departure of its COO to the recent loss of one of its top data center execs — has left onlookers scratching their heads. This story has been updated to include the fact that Zoph was fired from Thinking Machines. Topics AI, Barret Zoph, Google, In Brief, OpenAI, Thinking Machines Lab October 13 – 15 San Francisco Don’t miss out. The startup community will gather to answer a pivotal question: How do you build sustainably in the AI era? REGISTER NOW Newsletters See More Subscribe for the industry’s biggest tech news Related AI OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and 100 other companies call for action to defend against rogue AI Lucas Ropek 11 hours ago Security Here’s all the times AI has gone rogue and hacked other companies Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai 15 hours ago AI OpenAI to start showing ads on ChatGPT’s free and Go tiers in India Ivan Mehta 17 hours ago Latest in AI TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 Anthropic and OpenAI are joining the AI stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 TechCrunch Events 6 hours ago In Brief Barret Zoph, the Thinking Machines co-founder ousted before joining OpenAI, is now at Google Lucas Ropek 9 hours ago AI OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and 100 other companies call for action to defend against rogue AI Lucas Ropek 11 hours agoSource: TechCrunch — Published — Category: Business