Sundar Pichai reacts as Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis makes it to TIME's 100 Most Influential People list

Earlier this week, the TIME magazine released its coveted list of 100 Most Influential People from around the world. Among those featured was Demis Hassabis, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Google DeepMind -- the tech giant's artificial intelligence (AI) research lab.
In a post on the social media platform X, Hassabis said he was "honoured" to be on TIME's list and the magazine's cover page. "Congratulations to all the other people featured. Thank you to the brilliant Jennifer Doudna for the lovely writeup," he added in the post. Sundar Pichai, the Indian-origin CEO of Google, has reacted to Hassabis' feat.

Pichai congratulates Hassabis
Pichai, 52, who is also the CEO of Google's parent company Alphabet, replied to Hassabis' post saying, "Congrats!" As Hassabis mentioned, the TIME profile on him was penned by Jennifer Doudna -- a Nobel Prize-winning biochemist and founder of the Innovative Genomics Institute.

'Reshaping what's possible in science'
Profiling Hassabis, Doudna wrote he is "reshaping what’s possible in science."
She added, "His work at DeepMind—most notably the development of AlphaFold, which earned him a share of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry—is already accelerating discoveries across biology and medicine. The ripple effects are real: labs around the world, including my own, are using his AI tools to tackle rare genetic diseases, antibiotic resistance, and even climate-driven challenges in agriculture. Demis brings a rare kind of mindset to biology, one shaped by deep study of neuroscience, cognition, and computation. He doesn’t just build powerful systems; he builds understanding. His approach presents biology as a system of patterns that can be interpreted, predicted, and ultimately engineered in ways never before possible. In our conversations, I’ve been struck by his clarity of vision and sense of responsibility. He’s building tools that don’t just help us understand life, but help us shape it wisely. The future of biology won’t be siloed—it will be collaborative, interdisciplinary, and deeply creative. Demis is helping us get there faster."

TIME 100 list
Each year, TIME, an American news magazine, lists 100 people making strides in various walks of life such as politics, technology, and arts, among others. Other prominent names who made it to the list this year include United States President Donald Trump, world's richest person Elon Musk, Bangladesh's interim leader Muhammad Yunus, former tennis star Serena Williams, and the Indian-origin CEO of Vertex Pharmaceuticals Reshma Kewalramani.