Google CEO says company will review AI scholar’s abrupt exit

Google CEO Sundar Pichai has apologized for how a prominent artificial intelligence researcher’s abrupt departure last week has “seeded doubts” in the company.

Pichai told Google employees in a Wednesday memo obtained by Axios that the tech company is beginning a review of the circumstances leading up to Black computer scientist Timnit Gebru’s exit and how Google could have “led a more respectful process.”

Gebru, a top scholar in the field of AI ethics, said she was fired last week. Google has referred to it as a resignation.

Pichai’s note doesn’t call it either a firing or a resignation but says “we need to accept responsibility for the fact that a prominent Black, female leader with immense talent left Google unhappily.”