Microsoft hires Inflection founders to run new consumer AI division

Microsoft has made a significant move by hiring Mustafa Suleyman and Karen Simonyan, the co-founders of the high-profile AI startup Inflection AI, along with several of their colleagues. Suleyman, who is also a co-founder of DeepMind acquired by Google in 2014, will lead Microsoft’s newly formed consumer AI unit called Microsoft AI, while Simonyan will join as the chief scientist in the same group. Suleyman, now the EVP and CEO of Microsoft AI, will report directly to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

The hiring of Suleyman and Simonyan comes as Microsoft is expected to showcase its latest AI advancements for consumers in an upcoming event focused on Microsoft Copilot, Windows, and Surface.

Microsoft’s close relationship with Inflection AI is evident, with the cloud giant leading a $1.3 billion funding round for the startup less than a year ago. At the time, Inflection AI was building the world’s largest AI cluster, featuring 22,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs.

Suleyman will also oversee AI products and research for Copilot, Bing, and Edge at Microsoft, according to his tweet.

Nadella highlighted the caliber of talent joining Microsoft from Inflection AI, emphasizing their significant contributions to advancing AI over the past five years.

Inflection AI, founded in 2022 by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Suleyman, aimed to develop AI systems capable of engaging in open-ended dialogue, answering questions, and assisting with various tasks. However, the company announced a shift in focus to its AI studio business, where it builds and tests customer generative AI models. As part of this transition, Inflection AI plans to host Inflection-2.5 on Microsoft Azure to reach creators globally, with plans to expand to other cloud platforms soon. While the API is not currently available, the company expects it to be operational in the near future.