Microsoft Appoints Inflection Founders to Lead Innovative Consumer AI Division

Microsoft has made a significant move by hiring Mustafa Suleyman and Karén Simonyan, the co-founders of the acclaimed AI startup Inflection AI, along with several of their associates. This strategic acquisition reflects the commitment of Satya Nadella’s leadership to attract premier talent in the ever-evolving AI landscape.

Mustafa Suleyman, who previously co-founded DeepMind—an AI pioneer purchased by Google in 2014—will now lead Microsoft's newly established consumer AI unit, known as Microsoft AI. Karén Simonyan will take on the role of chief scientist within the same division. As EVP and CEO of Microsoft AI, Suleyman will report directly to CEO Nadella.

On Thursday, Microsoft is set to showcase its latest advancements in consumer AI, featuring Microsoft Copilot, Windows, and Surface, during a dedicated event. Notably, Microsoft has previously invested in Inflection AI, spearheading a $1.3 billion funding round less than a year ago. At that time, Inflection AI announced plans to create the world’s largest AI cluster, equipped with 22,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs.

In a recent tweet, Suleyman confirmed he will also oversee AI products and research for platforms such as Copilot, Bing, and Edge. Nadella highlighted the expertise of the Inflection team, noting their extensive contributions over the past five years in AI development and innovation.

Founded in 2022 by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Suleyman, Inflection AI quickly rose to prominence for its ambitious goal of creating AI systems capable of engaging in open-ended dialogue, tackling questions, and assisting with various tasks. Hoffman expressed confidence that all investors in Inflection AI would benefit from today’s developments and anticipates promising growth in the future. Following Suleyman's move to Microsoft, Sean White, co-founder of Braingels, will assume the role of CEO at Inflection AI.

In a blog post, Inflection AI announced a strategic pivot towards the AI studio business, focusing on building and testing customer generative AI models. They stated, “This renewed emphasis on our API also comes with some important changes within the company.”

As part of this transition, Inflection AI plans to host Inflection-2.5 on Microsoft Azure, aiming to make their innovations more accessible to creators globally. They indicated, “We’ll also ensure our models are available on other cloud hosting platforms soon. While the API is currently not available, we anticipate its launch in the near future.”

Microsoft's establishment of this new AI unit has been in the works for some time. Nadella had previously approached OpenAI co-founders Sam Altman and Greg Brockman when they briefly exited the company in December. He emphasized that both Microsoft and the broader world are in the early stages of an AI platform transformation, stating, “We must ensure we have the capability and capacity to innovate boldly.”