Demis Hassabis

Demis Hassabis, co-founder and CEO of Google DeepMind and 2024 Nobel laureate in chemistry for AlphaFold, joins Sequoia partner Konstantine Buhler at AI Ascent 2026 for a wide-ranging conversation about the path to AGI and what comes after. He explains why he believes AGI is achievable by 2030, why drug discovery could collapse from ten years to days, and why we should think of information, not matter or energy, as the most fundamental substance in the universe. Also: what Einstein would tell us about the limits of today's models, and why the next year or two will be critical for humanity.

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the Co-Founder & CEO of Google DeepMind - working on AGI, responsible for AI breakthroughs such as AlphaGo, the first program to beat the world champion at the game of Go; and AlphaFold, which cracked the 50-year grand challenge of protein structure prediction and was recognised with the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Demis is revolutionising drug discovery at Isomorphic Labs. Ultimately, trying to understand the fundamental nature of reality. AGENDA: 00:04:00 — What Actually Counts as AGI; and Where Are We Today? 00:05:00 — What Are the Biggest Bottlenecks Holding AI Back Today? 00:06:00 — Have We Hit the Limits of Scaling Laws? 00:07:00 — Where Is AI Ahead of Expectations; and What's Still Missing? 00:07:30 — Why Can't AI Systems Learn Continuously Like Humans? 00:08:30 — How Did DeepMind Go from Behind to Leading the Pack? 00:11:00 — Are We Heading Toward Model Commoditization; or Winner-Takes-All? 00:12:00 — What Does the Future of Open Source Really Look Like? 00:13:00 — What Does a Post LLM World Look Like? 00:14:45 — Can AI Really Fix Drug Discovery—and Cut the 10-Year Timeline? 00:17:00 — What Does "Good" AI Regulation Actually Look Like? 00:18:00 — Who Should Be the Ultimate Arbiter of Truth in an AI World? 00:19:30 — If Demis Had One Shot to Fix AI Safety, What Would He Do? 00:21:00 — Is This Time Different for Jobs; or Will History Repeat Itself? 00:22:00 — Is AGI Bigger Than the Industrial Revolution; and Faster? 00:23:00 — Are We Underestimating AI Despite All the Hype? 00:23:30 — Does AI Lead to Massive Inequality; or Universal Prosperity? 00:24:30 — How Do We Solve the Energy Crisis Created by AI? 00:26:00 — Why Stay in the UK Instead of Moving to Silicon Valley? 00:28:00 — Will Europe Ever Build a Trillion-Dollar Tech Giant? 00:29:30 — Meeting Elon Musk for the First Time? 00:31:00 — What Big Questions About AI Is No One Talking About? 00:31:30 — What Does Demis Want His Legacy to Be?

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the CEO of Google DeepMind. Hassabis joins Big Technology Podcast to discuss where AI progress really stands today, where the next breakthroughs might come from, and whether we’ve hit AGI already. Tune in for a deep discussion covering the latest in AI research, from continual learning to world models. We also dig into product, discussing Google’s big bet on AI glasses, its advertising plans, and AI coding. We also cover what AI means for knowledge work and scientific discovery. Hit play for a wide-ranging, high-signal conversation about where AI is headed next from one of the leaders driving it forward.  --- Enjoying Big Technology Podcast? Please rate us five stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ in your podcast app of choice. Want a discount for Big Technology on Substack + Discord? Here’s 25% off for the first year: https://www.bigtechnology.com/subscribe?coupon=0843016b Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the CEO of Google DeepMind. He joined Big Technology Podcast in early 2025 discuss the cutting edge of AI and where the research is heading. In this conversation, we cover the path to artificial general intelligence, how long it will take to get there, how to build world models, whether AIs can be creative, and how AIs are trying to deceive researchers. Stay tuned for the second half where we discuss Google's plan for smart glasses and Hassabis's vision for a virtual cell. Hit play for a fascinating discussion with an AI pioneer that will both break news and leave you deeply informed about the state of AI and its promising future. --- Enjoying Big Technology Podcast? Please rate us five stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ in your podcast app of choice. Want a discount for Big Technology on Substack + Discord? Here’s 25% off for the first year: https://www.bigtechnology.com/subscribe?coupon=0843016b Questions? Feedback? Write to: bigtechnologypodcast@gmail.com --- Wealthfront.com/bigtech. If eligible for the overall boosted 3.90% rate offered with this promo, your boosted rate is subject to change if the 3.25% base rate decreases during the 3-month promo period. The Cash Account, which is not a deposit account, is offered by Wealthfront Brokerage LLC ("Wealthfront Brokerage"), Member FINRA/SIPC, not a bank. The Annual Percentage Yield ("APY") on cash deposits as of 12/19/25, is representative, requires no minimum, and may change at any time. The APY reflects the weighted average of deposit balances at participating Program Banks, which are not allocated equally. Wealthfront Brokerage sweeps cash balances to Program Banks, where they earn the variable base APY. Instant withdrawals are subject to certain conditions and processing times may vary. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Google’s much anticipated new large language model Gemini 3 begins rolling out today. We’ll tell you what we learned from an early product briefing and bring you our conversation with Google executives Demis Hassabis and Josh Woodward, just ahead of the launch.   Guests: Demis Hassabis, chief executive and co-founder of Google DeepMind Josh Woodward, vice president of Google Labs and Google Gemini   Additional Reading:  The Man Who ‘A.G.I.-Pilled’ Google   We want to hear from you. Email us at hardfork@nytimes.com. Find “Hard Fork” on YouTube and TikTok. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Josh Woodward

Vice President

GoogleGoogle Labs

(0:00) Introducing Sir Demis Hassabis, reflecting on his Nobel Prize win (2:39) What is Google DeepMind? How does it interact with Google and Alphabet? (4:01) Genie 3 world model (9:21) State of robotics models, form factors, and more (14:42) AI science breakthroughs, measuring AGI (20:49) Nano-Banana and the future of creative tools, democratization of creativity (24:44) Isomorphic Labs, probabilistic vs deterministic, scaling compute, a golden age of science Thanks to our partners for making this happen! Solana - Solana is the high performance network powering internet capital markets, payments, and crypto applications. Connect with investors, crypto founders, and entrepreneurs at Solana's global flagship event during Abu Dhabi Finance Week & F1: solana.com/breakpoint. https://solana.com/ OKX - The new way to build your crypto portfolio and use it in daily life. We call it the new money app. https://www.okx.com/ Google Cloud - The next generation of unicorns is building on Google Cloud's industry-leading, fully integrated AI stack: infrastructure, platform, models, agents, and data. https://cloud.google.com/ IREN - IREN AI Cloud, powered by NVIDIA GPUs, provides the scale, performance, and reliability to accelerate your AI journey. https://iren.com/ Oracle - Step into the future of enterprise productivity at Oracle AI Experience Live. https://www.oracle.com/ Circle - The America-based company behind USDC — a fully-reserved, enterprise-grade stablecoin at the core of the emerging internet financial system. https://www.circle.com/ BVNK - Building stablecoin-powered financial infrastructure that helps businesses send, store, and spend value instantly, anywhere in the world. https://www.bvnk.com/ Polymarket: https://www.polymarket.com/ Athletic Brewing: https://athleticbrewing.com/ Follow Demis: https://x.com/demishassabis Follow the besties: https://x.com/chamath https://x.com/Jason https://x.com/DavidSacks https://x.com/friedberg Follow on X: https://x.com/theallinpod Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theallinpod Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theallinpod Follow on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/allinpod Intro Music Credit: https://rb.gy/tppkzl https://x.com/yung_spielburg Intro Video Credit: https://x.com/TheZachEffect

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the CEO of Google DeepMind and Nobel Prize winner for his groundbreaking work in protein structure prediction using AI. Thank you for listening ❤ Check out our sponsors: https://lexfridman.com/sponsors/ep475-sc See below for timestamps, transcript, and to give feedback, submit questions, contact Lex, etc. Transcript: https://lexfridman.com/demis-hassabis-2-transcript CONTACT LEX: Feedback – give feedback to Lex: https://lexfridman.com/survey AMA – submit questions, videos or call-in: https://lexfridman.com/ama Hiring – join our team: https://lexfridman.com/hiring Other – other ways to get in touch: https://lexfridman.com/contact EPISODE LINKS: Demis’s X: https://x.com/demishassabis DeepMind’s X: https://x.com/GoogleDeepMind DeepMind’s Instagram: https://instagram.com/GoogleDeepMind DeepMind’s Website: https://deepmind.google/ Gemini’s Website: https://gemini.google.com/ Isomorphic Labs: https://isomorphiclabs.com/ The MANIAC (book): https://amzn.to/4lOXJ81 Life Ascending (book): https://amzn.to/3AhUP7z SPONSORS: To support this podcast, check out our sponsors & get discounts: Hampton: Community for high-growth founders and CEOs. Go to https://joinhampton.com/lex Fin: AI agent for customer service. Go to https://fin.ai/lex Shopify: Sell stuff online. Go to https://shopify.com/lex LMNT: Zero-sugar electrolyte drink mix. Go to https://drinkLMNT.com/lex AG1: All-in-one daily nutrition drink. Go to https://drinkag1.com/lex OUTLINE: (00:00) – Introduction (00:29) – Sponsors, Comments, and Reflections (08:40) – Learnable patterns in nature (12:22) – Computation and P vs NP (21:00) – Veo 3 and understanding reality (25:24) – Video games (37:26) – AlphaEvolve (43:27) – AI research (47:51) – Simulating a biological organism (52:34) – Origin of life (58:49) – Path to AGI (1:09:35) – Scaling laws (1:12:51) – Compute (1:15:38) – Future of energy (1:19:34) – Human nature (1:24:28) – Google and the race to AGI (1:42:27) – Competition and AI talent (1:49:01) – Future of programming (1:55:27) – John von Neumann (2:04:41) – p(doom) (2:09:24) – Humanity (2:12:30) – Consciousness and quantum computation (2:18:40) – David Foster Wallace (2:25:54) – Education and research PODCAST LINKS: – Podcast Website: https://lexfridman.com/podcast – Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2lwqZIr – Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2nEwCF8 – RSS: https://lexfridman.com/feed/podcast/ – Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrAXtmErZgOdP_8GztsuKi9nrraNbKKp4 – Clips Channel: https://www.youtube.com/lexclips

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

This week, we take a field trip to Google and report back about everything the company announced at its biggest show of the year, Google I/O. Then, we sit down with Google DeepMind’s chief executive and co-founder, Demis Hassabis, to discuss what his A.I. lab is building, the future of education, and what life could look like in 2030. Guest: Demis Hassabis, co-founder and chief executive of Google DeepMind Additional Reading: At Google I/O, everything is changing and normal and scary and chill Google Unveils A.I. Chatbot, Signaling a New Era for Search Google DeepMind C.E.O. Demis Hassabis on the Path From Chatbots to A.G.I. We want to hear from you. Email us at hardfork@nytimes.com. Find “Hard Fork” on YouTube and TikTok. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the CEO of Google DeepMind. Sergey Brin is the co-founder of Google. The two leading tech executives join Alex Kantrowitz for a live interview at Google's IO developer conference to discuss the frontiers of AI research. Tune in to hear their perspective on whether scaling is tapped out, how reasoning techniques have performed, what AGI actually means, the potential for an intelligence explosion, and much more. Tune in for a deep look into AI's cutting edge featuring two executives building it. --- Enjoying Big Technology Podcast? Please rate us five stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ in your podcast app of choice. Want a discount for Big Technology on Substack? Here’s 25% off for the first year: https://www.bigtechnology.com/subscribe?coupon=0843016b Questions? Feedback? Write to: bigtechnologypodcast@gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Sergey Brin

Co-Founder

Google

How can AI help us understand and master deeply complex systems—from the game Go, which has 10 to the power 170 possible positions a player could pursue, or proteins, which, on average, can fold in 10 to the power 300 possible ways? This week, Reid and Aria are joined by Demis Hassabis. Demis is a British artificial intelligence researcher, co-founder, and CEO of the AI company, DeepMind. Under his leadership, DeepMind developed Alpha Go, the first AI to defeat a human world champion in Go and later created AlphaFold, which solved the 50-year-old protein folding problem. He's considered one of the most influential figures in AI. Demis, Reid, and Aria discuss game theory, medicine, multimodality, and the nature of innovation and creativity. For more info on the podcast and transcripts of all the episodes, visit https://www.possible.fm/podcast/  Listen to more from Possible here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the CEO of Google DeepMind. He joins Big Technology Podcast to discuss the cutting edge of AI and where the research is heading. In this conversation, we cover the path to artificial general intelligence, how long it will take to get there, how to build world models, whether AIs can be creative, and how AIs are trying to deceive researchers. Stay tuned for the second half where we discuss Google's plan for smart glasses and Hassabis's vision for a virtual cell. Hit play for a fascinating discussion with an AI pioneer that will both break news and leave you deeply informed about the state of AI and its promising future. --- Enjoying Big Technology Podcast? Please rate us five stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ in your podcast app of choice. For weekly updates on the show, sign up for the pod newsletter on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/6901970121829801984/ Want a discount for Big Technology on Substack? Here’s 40% off for the first year: https://tinyurl.com/bigtechnology Questions? Feedback? Write to: bigtechnologypodcast@gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Can AI help us answer life's biggest questions? In this visionary conversation, Google DeepMind cofounder and CEO Demis Hassabis delves into the history and incredible capabilities of AI with head of TED Chris Anderson. Hassabis explains how AI models like AlphaFold — which accurately predicted the shapes of all 200 million proteins known to science in under a year — have already accelerated scientific discovery in ways that will benefit humanity. Next up? Hassabis says AI has the potential to unlock the greatest mysteries surrounding our minds, bodies and the universe. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Here is my episode with Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind We discuss: * Why scaling is an artform * Adding search, planning, & AlphaZero type training atop LLMs * Making sure rogue nations can't steal weights * The right way to align superhuman AIs and do an intelligence explosion Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here. Timestamps (0:00:00) - Nature of intelligence (0:05:56) - RL atop LLMs (0:16:31) - Scaling and alignment (0:24:13) - Timelines and intelligence explosion (0:28:42) - Gemini training (0:35:30) - Governance of superhuman AIs (0:40:42) - Safety, open source, and security of weights (0:47:00) - Multimodal and further progress (0:54:18) - Inside Google DeepMind Get full access to Dwarkesh Podcast at www.dwarkesh.com/subscribe

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

This week’s episode is a conversation with Demis Hassabis, the head of Google’s artificial intelligence division. We talk about Google’s latest A.I. models, Gemini and Gemma; the existential risks of artificial intelligence; his timelines for artificial general intelligence; and what he thinks the world will look like post-A.G.I. Additional listening and reading:  A.I. Could Solve Some of Humanity’s Hardest Problems. It Already Has. This interview was recorded on Wednesday. Since then, Google has temporarily suspended Gemini’s ability to generate images of humans, following criticism of images the chatbot generated of people of color in Nazi-era uniforms. Google Is Giving Away Some of the A.I. That Powers Chatbots We want to hear from you. Email us at hardfork@nytimes.com. Find “Hard Fork” on YouTube and TikTok. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Today, I’m talking to Demis Hassabis, the CEO of Google DeepMind, the newly created division of Google responsible for AI efforts across the company. Google DeepMind is the result of an internal merger: Google acquired Demis’ DeepMind startup in 2014 and ran it as a separate company inside its parent company, Alphabet, while Google itself had an AI team called Google Brain.  Google has been showing off AI demos for years now, but with the explosion of ChatGPT and a renewed threat from Microsoft in search, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai made the decision to bring DeepMind into Google itself earlier this year to create… Google DeepMind. What’s interesting is that Google Brain and DeepMind were not necessarily compatible or even focused on the same things: DeepMind was famous for applying AI to things like games and protein-folding simulations. The AI that beat world champions at Go, the ancient board game? That was DeepMind’s AlphaGo. Meanwhile, Google Brain was more focused on what’s come to be the familiar generative AI toolset: large language models for chatbots, and editing features in Google Photos. This was a culture clash and a big structure decision with the goal of being more competitive and faster to market with AI products. And the competition isn’t just OpenAI and Microsoft — you might have seen a memo from a Google engineer floating around the web recently claiming that Google has no competitive moat in AI because open-source models running on commodity hardware are rapidly evolving and catching up to the tools run by the giants. Demis confirmed that the memo was real but said it was part of Google’s debate culture, and he disagreed with it because he has other ideas about where Google’s competitive edge might come into play. We also talked about AI risk and artificial general intelligence. Demis is not shy that his goal is building an AGI, and we talked through what risks and regulations should be in place and on what timeline. Demis recently signed onto a 22-word statement about AI risk with OpenAI’s Sam Altman and others that simply reads, “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war.” That’s pretty chill, but is that the real risk right now? Or is it just a distraction from other more tangible problems like AI replacing labor in various creative industries? We also talked about the new kinds of labor AI is creating — armies of low-paid taskers classifying data in countries like Kenya and India in order to train AI systems. I wanted to know if Demis thought these jobs were here to stay or just a temporary side effect of the AI boom. This one really hits all the Decoder high points: there’s the big idea of AI, a lot of problems that come with it, an infinite array of complicated decisions to be made, and of course, a gigantic org chart decision in the middle of it all. Demis and I got pretty in the weeds, and I still don’t think we covered it all, so we’ll have to have him back soon. Links: Inside the AI Factory Inside Google’s AI culture clash - The Verge A leaked Google memo raises the alarm about open-source A.I. | Fortune The End of Search As You Know It Google’s Sundar Pichai talks Search, AI, and dancing with Microsoft - The Verge DeepMind reportedly lost a yearslong bid to win more independence from Google - The Verge Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23542786 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Jackie McDermott and Raghu Manavalan, and it was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters, and our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind

Demis Hassabis is the CEO and co-founder of DeepMind. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors: – Mailgun: https://lexfridman.com/mailgun – InsideTracker: https://insidetracker.com/lex to get 20% off – Onnit: https://lexfridman.com/onnit to get up to 10% off – Indeed: https://indeed.com/lex to get $75 credit – Magic Spoon: https://magicspoon.com/lex and use code LEX to get $5 off EPISODE LINKS: Demis’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/demishassabis DeepMind’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/DeepMind DeepMind’s Instagram: https://instagram.com/deepmind DeepMind’s Website: https://deepmind.com Plasma control paper: https://nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04301-9 Quantum simulation paper: https://science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abj6511 The Emperor’s New Mind (book): https://amzn.to/3bx03lo Life Ascending (book): https://amzn.to/3AhUP7z PODCAST INFO: Podcast website: https://lexfridman.com/podcast Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2lwqZIr Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2nEwCF8 RSS: https://lexfridman.com/feed/podcast/ YouTube Full Episodes: https://youtube.com/lexfridman YouTube Clips: https://youtube.com/lexclips SUPPORT & CONNECT: – Check out the sponsors above, it’s the best way to support this podcast – Support on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/lexfridman – Twitter: https://twitter.com/lexfridman – Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lexfridman – LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lexfridman – Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lexfridman – Medium: https://medium.com/@lexfridman OUTLINE: Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time. (00:00) – Introduction (07:17) – Turing Test (14:43) – Video games (36:18) – Simulation (38:29) – Consciousness (43:29) – AlphaFold (57:09) – Solving intelligence (1:09:28) – Open sourcing AlphaFold & MuJoCo (1:19:34) – Nuclear fusion (1:23:38) – Quantum simulation (1:26:46) – Physics (1:30:13) – Origin of life (1:34:52) – Aliens (1:42:59) – Intelligent life (1:46:08) – Conscious AI (1:59:23) – Power (2:03:53) – Advice for young people (2:11:59) – Meaning of life

Demis Hassabis

CEO

Google DeepMindDeepMind