OpenAI's $3 billion deal to acquire the AI coding startup Windsurf fell apart — so Windsurf turned to OpenAI competitor Google instead.

Bloomberg reported last week that after Windsurf's deal with OpenAI crumbled, Google stepped in and struck a deal with the AI coding startup to pay around $2.4 billion for talent and licensing rights.

Google is not investing in Windsurf, but is rather paying to hire the startup's CEO Varun Mohan, co-founder Douglas Chen, and a small group of other senior Windsurf staffers to work on Google's DeepMind AI team. Most of Windsurf's 250 employees will stay with the startup and focus on creating innovations for its business clients.

"We're excited to welcome some top AI coding talent from Windsurf's team to Google DeepMind to advance our work in agentic coding," Google said in a statement, per Reuters.

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