OpenAI Hires Google DeepMind AI Legend Noam Shazeer and Former Trump White House AI Policy Official

Noam Shazeer and Former Trump White House AI Policy Official">

OpenAI is bringing on two high-profile hires in the lead-up to its public debut: Noam Shazeer, a Google DeepMind AI legend, and Dean Ball, a former Trump White House AI policy official. Shazeer, who co-led Gemini and founded AI role-playing startup Character AI, announced his departure from Google on Wednesday. He had been at Google since 2000, leaving only for a three-year period when he left to co-found Character AI.

In 2021, Google re-hired Shazeer in a $2.7 billion deal that gave the tech giant access to Character AI's technology. Shazeer is credited with being one of the foundational minds behind modern generative AI, co-authoring the seminal 2017 paper 'Attention Is All You Need,' which introduced the Transformer architecture. Before leaving Google, Shazeer had reportedly voiced opinions on internal messaging boards on transgender identity and Israel's war in Gaza, resulting in management deleting his posts.

OpenAI is also shoring up its policy credentials by bringing Ball to the team. Ball had a brief stint in the White House, where he helped publish America's AI Action Plan before stepping down to rejoin the techno-libertarian think tank the Foundation for American Innovation as a senior fellow. 'I am pleased and honored to announce that, on July 6, I'll be joining OpenAI as leader of a new team called Strategic Futures,' Ball wrote on X on Thursday.

'Our mandate will be to help the company's leadership shape frontier AI policy.' Ball will report directly to Chief Strategy Officer Jason Kwon. The 'small, high-agency team' will focus on 'matters pertaining to: catastrophic risk, recursive self-improvement, labor market impact, and the relationship between the frontier labs, governments (particularly the U.S. Federal Government), and society,' Ball wrote in a blog post.

The Strategic Futures team will cover both public-facing policy and internal governance, he added. That last is important — Ball noted that 'almost by necessity,' AI labs will have to lead on AI governance decisions. 'In other words, internal governance will be more central to the future of AI than most people realize,' Ball wrote.

Ball's decision to join OpenAI comes as Anthropic battles with the U.S. government. Late last week, President Donald Trump ordered an export control ban on Anthropic's latest models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, leading to the AI firm being forced to take the models down entirely to avoid noncompliance.

OpenAI's strategic hiring of Shazeer and Ball underscores its efforts to establish itself as a leader in the AI space ahead of its IPO. The company's ability to attract top talent from Google and the White House reflects its growing influence and resources. As AI continues to play a larger role in shaping the tech industry, OpenAI's moves will likely have significant implications for the broader AI landscape.