Meet Varun Mohan: Not from IIT or IIM, Yet He Turned Down ₹25,000 Crore Offer from OpenAI to Work at Google
Meet Varun Mohan: Not from IIT or IIM, Yet He Turned Down ₹25,000 Crore Offer from OpenAI to Work at Google
In the fast-moving world of artificial intelligence, Indian-origin tech entrepreneur Varun Mohan has taken a bold step by rejecting a massive $3 billion acquisition offer from OpenAI. Instead, Mohan and his team are heading to Google DeepMind in what’s being called a “reverse-acqui-hire”, a move that’s catching the attention of the global tech community.
Mohan, co-founder and CEO of the AI startup Windsurf, won’t be selling his company. Instead, Google is paying $2.4 billion to license Windsurf’s core technology and bring its top talent on board. While Windsurf continues to operate independently, many of its top brains, including co-founder Douglas Chen and several key researchers, will now be working at DeepMind.
So, who is Varun Mohan? Raised in Sunnyvale, California, Mohan is the son of Indian immigrants. He showed brilliance early in school, especially in math and coding competitions. He later studied at the prestigious MIT, where he focused on machine learning, operating systems, and distributed computing.
Before launching Windsurf, Mohan worked at major tech companies, including Nuro, Quora, LinkedIn, Samsung, and Databricks. In 2021, he teamed up with his longtime friend Chen to start a company called Codeium, which was later rebranded to Windsurf. Initially focused on GPU virtualization, the project evolved into an AI-powered coding platform that soon caught global attention.
Under Mohan’s leadership, Windsurf became one of the fastest-growing AI startups. In just four months, over a million developers signed up for the platform. The company also raised $243 million in funding, reaching a valuation of $1.25 billion. One of Mohan’s standout contributions was promoting the concept of an “agentic IDE”, a smart development tool powered by large language models that can handle repetitive coding tasks, allowing engineers to concentrate on solving real problems.
With Mohan now stepping into a leading role at Google DeepMind, Windsurf’s future remains uncertain. Jeff Wang, previously the company’s business head, has taken over as interim CEO. Around 250 employees continue to operate the startup as Mohan embarks on his new chapter.
This decision to choose collaboration over acquisition has not only sparked debate but also highlighted Mohan’s vision of long-term impact over short-term gains. And now, with the backing of Google, Varun Mohan may be poised to change the future of how we code with AI.
