Cognition swiftly snapped up the remnants of Windsurf. The deal highlights the essential role of data in AI advancement.

The "acqui-hire" strategy is on fire in this battle among tech titans seeking AI dominance and a Goliath just beat David

In a stunning reversal, Google DeepMind acquires Windsurf’s top talent just weeks after OpenAI’s $3B deal collapsed over IP tensions with Microsoft.

With a $2.4 billion agreement to license technology and hire top talent from AI coding startup Windsurf, Google has stepped up its efforts to dominate artificial intelligence. Varun Mohan, the CEO and co-founder of Windsurf,

As of Friday, Windsurf’s head of business, Jeff Wang, will take over as the startup’s interim CEO, he announced in a post on social media. Most of Windsurf’s 250 person team is not headed to Google DeepMind and will continue offering its AI coding tools for enterprise customers.

Windsurf CEO Varun Mohan, co-founder Douglas Chen, and some members of the coding tool's research and development team will join Google's DeepMind AI division.

Bay Area tech companies are battling to build popular, useful artificial intelligence — and the fight just ripped apart a startup. Windsurf, an AI company based in Mountain View, began last week as a reported $3 billion acquisition target for OpenAI.

The acquihire-on-steroids trend is unique to this tech boom, and could have big implications for current and future AI founders.