Jeff Dean, Google's 30th employee and chief scientist, is leaving after nearly three decades to co-found AI startup Discovery Loop, marking the end of an era at Google.

Gemini co-lead Oriol Vinyals also departing

Jeff Dean and other high-profile Google executives have founded Discovery Loop, a startup that will seek AI-powered breakthroughs in everything from drug discovery to chip design.

Announcing the venture on X, Dean wrote, "We are founding Discovery Loop... a Public Benefit Corporation whose mission is to automate machine learning, science, and engineering to…