• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, April 2, 2025

Google confirmed Wednesday that Sissie Hsiao -- vice president and general manager who led the company’s effort to create an AI chatbot, originally called Bard and now Gemini -- will step down.

Replacing Hsiao will be Josh Woodward, who leads Google Labs and oversaw the launch of NotebookLM, the company’s tool that turns text into a podcast-like show.

Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis believes the move will “sharpen our focus on the next evolution of the Gemini app.” He said Woodward will remain head of Google Labs while shaping the next chapter of Gemini, Semafor reported after reviewing a memo to staff from Google.

Hsiao has been at Google since 2006, working on Search, Docs, Analytics, and Advertising before taking on Google Assistant in 2021 and then Gemini. 

Google researchers had pioneered the transformer-based architecture that allowed the creation of large language models, which powered ChatGPT, Semafor reported. It's the technology’s unpredictable nature that led the company to keep its chatbot experiments mostly under wraps.

Semafor reported that in a separate staff memo, Hsiao called her time as head of Bard team “chapter 1,″and said she was optimistic in handing the baton to Woodward for “chapter 2.”

She plans to take a short break and then return to Google in a new role.