Amazon Reorganization Combines AI, Silicon and Quantum Computing

Amazon has formed a new organization that will bring together its artificial intelligence (AI) models, silicon development and quantum computing.

The company’s artificial general intelligence ( AGI ) team will be included in the organization, as will the Nova AI models and the Graviton , Trainium and Nitro products, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said in a Wednesday (Dec. 17) message shared with employees and posted online.

The new organization will be led by Peter DeSantis , who has been with Amazon for 27 years, most recently leading all the company’s AWS Utility Computing services, according to the message.

“With our Nova 2 models just launched at re:Invent , our custom silicon growing rapidly, and the advantages of optimizing across models, chips, and cloud software and infrastructure, we wanted to free Peter up to focus his energy, invention cycles, and leadership on these new areas,” Jassy said in the message. “Peter will report directly to me.”

As part of this organizational change, Pieter Abbeel , an AI researcher who works with Amazon’s robotics team, will now lead the company’s frontier model research team, which builds the base model, in AGI, while continuing to work in robotics, according to the message.

In addition, Rohit Prasad , who led the creation of Nova and the AGI organization over the past two years, has decided to leave Amazon at the end of the year, per the message.

“The path ahead is full of opportunity,” Jassy said in the message. “With the foundation that’s been built, the traction we’re seeing, and Peter’s leadership bringing unified focus to these technologies, we’re well-positioned to lead and deliver meaningful capabilities for our customers. I’m excited about what this team will build and how these foundational technologies will help shape Amazon’s future.”

PYMNTS reported Dec. 5 that Amazon unveiled a comprehensive AI strategy and launched new Nova foundation models at its annual re:Invent conference.

The company made a flurry of AI announcements representing the latest escalation in a heated battle among tech giants to dominate the lucrative enterprise AI market, while the Nova family of AI models debuted with six models, each optimized for different tasks.