# Varun Mohan

> Varun Mohan is the co-founder and former CEO of Windsurf, the AI coding company that evolved from GPU infrastructure into Codeium and then a standalone agentic editor. He joined Google DeepMind in July 2025 and, as of May 2026, is a director of software engineering working on Google Antigravity.

- **Role:** Director, Software Engineering, Google DeepMind
- **Organizations:** Google DeepMind, Windsurf (formerly Codeium), Exafunction, Nuro
- **Education:** Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; Master of Engineering in Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- **Known for:** Co-founded the company behind Codeium and Windsurf., Led two major product shifts from GPU infrastructure to coding assistance to a standalone AI editor., Reported more than one million developers had tried Windsurf within roughly four months of its launch.

## Career timeline

- **2017** — Graduated from MIT and went on to work on autonomous vehicle infrastructure at Nuro.
- **2021** — Co-founded Exafunction with Douglas Chen to build GPU virtualization and compiler software.
- **2022** — Shifted the company toward an AI coding assistant, Codeium, after generative models changed the founders’ view of the market.
- **2024** — Launched Windsurf, a standalone AI-powered editor built around the Cascade agent.
- **2025-04** — Said more than one million developers had tried Windsurf in a little over four months.
- **2025-07** — Joined Google DeepMind with Chen and other Windsurf researchers after a nonexclusive technology license agreement; Cognition acquired Windsurf days later.
- **2026-05** — Co-authored Google’s I/O developer announcement as Director, Software Engineering, Google DeepMind, describing Antigravity 2.0 and related tools.

## Achievements

- Co-founded the company behind Codeium and Windsurf.
- Led two major product shifts from GPU infrastructure to coding assistance to a standalone AI editor.
- Reported more than one million developers had tried Windsurf within roughly four months of its launch.
- Helped bring the Antigravity developer platform to Google I/O 2026 as a Google DeepMind director.

## Latest updates

- **2026-05** — Google listed Mohan as Director, Software Engineering, Google DeepMind, on its I/O developer announcement for Antigravity 2.0, CLI and SDK.
- **2025-07** — Mohan joined Google DeepMind; Cognition announced its acquisition of Windsurf three days later.

## Links

- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/varunkmohan
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/_mohansolo

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/varun-mohan
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-09-29