The deal will see Windsurf CEO Varun Mohan, co-founder Douglas Chen and a small team join Google’s DeepMind division.
Also licensing key tech
Further, Google will invest $2.4 billion in a non-exclusive deal to license Windsurf’s technology, reports Reuters, among others.
OpenAI had been in long-winding talks to buy the company, in its biggest deal yet, and many said it was just around the corner, as late as in May, 2025.
Exclusivity with OpenAi had ended
According to an OpenAI spokesman, the exclusivity part of the talks with Windsurf had expired a short while ago, leaving the company free to explore other options.
The space for agentic coding has been heating up lately, with 30% of coding done by AI at Big Tech companies, AI coding is becoming mandatory in certain places, and hand coding is rapidly becoming obsolete.
— Gemini is one of the best models available and we’ve been investing in its advanced capabilities for developers, Chris Pappas, a spokesperson for Google, told The Verge. — We’re excited to welcome some top AI coding talent from Windsurf’s team to Google DeepMind to advance our work in agentic coding.
A rush for top AI talent
The acquihire move from Google comes after many moves lately for top AI talent, as Zuckerberg of Meta has been aggressively hiring for his Superintelligence Labs, acquiring 49% of Scale AI and poaching talent from DeepMind, Openai and Anthropic.
And just four days ago OpenAI annouced four new hires from Tesla, xAI and Meta, showing how the job market for AI talent is tightening up.
Windsurf was valued at $1.2 billion during their most recent funding round in 2024, which was a lifetime ago in the AI space.
Most of Windsurf’s employees will stand pat, and the company will continue as an independent startup, but will now «prioritize innovation for its enterprise clients,» writes Reuters.
Read more: Reporting by Reuters, The Verge, added detail by Fortune.