Google has announced a change in leadership for its Knowledge & Information (K&I) team, along with some structural adjustments to its Gemini team. Nick Fox will take over from Prabhakar Raghavan as the head of K&I, which encompasses the company's Search, Ads, Geo, and Commerce products, according to an announcement on Thursday (Oct. 17) from Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet. Raghavan will transition to the position of chief technologist at Google, where he will collaborate with Pichai and other leaders to "provide technical direction and leadership and foster a culture of tech excellence, " as stated in the announcement. During Raghavan's tenure at K&I, the team successfully launched AI Overviews in Search; introduced new search modalities such as Circle to Search, video understanding, and "shop what you see" in Lens; incorporated AI-driven features like immersive view and virtual try-on in Maps and Shopping; and advanced AI-powered ad formats while streamlining campaign management, according to the announcement. “I’m incredibly grateful to Prabhakar for the solid foundation and leadership team he’s developed at K&I, ” Pichai noted. “This includes his outstanding senior leaders and Nick, who is well-prepared to step into his new role as SVP of K&I!” Fox, previously a member of Raghavan’s leadership team at K&I who will now take the helm, has shown strong leadership across the various divisions of K&I and was instrumental in Ads, having launched products such as Google Fi, as per the announcement. “I often rely on Nick to address our toughest product challenges, and he consistently delivers results with determination, speed, and positivity, ” Pichai remarked in the announcement. Additionally, the announcement revealed that the Gemini app team, led by Sissie Hsaio, will now be part of Google DeepMind under Demis Hassabis, allowing for closer collaboration between the app team and the Gemini models team. It also mentioned that the Assistant teams dedicated to devices and home experiences will shift to the Platforms & Devices division to be more closely aligned with the products for which they are developing assistants. On Oct.

9, Google DeepMind announced it had developed an AI model capable of predicting key properties of potential drugs, with the goal of expediting pharmaceutical research. On Tuesday (Oct. 15), Google stated that it had overhauled its shopping platform with an AI-powered experience that will begin rolling out across the United States in the coming weeks.