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Microsoft researcher John Langford leaves, says AI Frontiers group is over
John Langford wrote that he left Microsoft after AI Frontiers was moved into Microsoft AI in September, and that the ~50-person group is over. Microsoft has not responded in the coverage here.
- hunch.net is now reporting this
- New headline Was: “Microsoft Researcher John Langford Exits. AI Frontiers Group Declared Finished”
- Our desk filed its story
- businessexaminer.ca is now reporting this
John Langford, a partner researcher manager at Microsoft Research New York, wrote on his Machine Learning (Theory) blog that he has left Microsoft and that AI Frontiers is over1. Business Examiner reported the same, citing a Digg summary of that post, which it said he announced on social media on Nov. 6.
Langford wrote that he and colleagues created AI Frontiers inside Microsoft Research in 2023 after ChatGPT's release, seeking more organized research than was typical there1. He described the group as about 50 people1.
Much of the work, he wrote, was on making agents function, naming Autogen, an orchestration framework, and Fara, a computer-use agent1.
In early September, he wrote, the group was reorganized into Microsoft AI1. He described Microsoft AI's leadership philosophy as focused on scaling rather than research and said he could not get innovations used or seriously considered there1.
He wrote that he situated his team as best he could and left1. A return to Microsoft Research held little appeal, he said, because he doubted research could reach use from there either1.
"I am just not comfortable being at a company where the research I do has no path to real use," Langford wrote1. He added that there will not be internships with the group in the coming year and offered best wishes to colleagues remaining1.
Microsoft's response is not in Langford's post or in the Examiner recap1. The company's formal status for remaining staff is not detailed in those accounts1.