No trench coat, no nap pod required, no stock options (yet). But Agent Smith has entered the Googleplex.
Google employees are using a new internal AI tool called Agent Smith that can automate tasks such as coding, three people familiar with the matter said.
Smith is so popular that access had to be restricted to deal with the influx of employees, two people said.
Smith (possibly a reference to the antagonist in The Matrix) is built on Google’s existing agent coding platform, Antigravity, and can interact with a variety of internal tools. It works asynchronously or on its own in the background without an active laptop, and employees can use their mobile phones to check in and give instructions to it. Smith launched earlier this year, one of the people said.
This is already proving to be a big help for some software engineers, the people said, as the company aggressively deploys AI to improve efficiency. Google and leaders across the technology industry see agents as a way to take productivity to the next big leap.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin told Google employees at a recent town hall that agents will play a bigger role at Google this year, according to people present. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is building a unique system to help run the company, The Wall Street Journal reported.
When asked about Agent Smith and the company’s broader vision for AI agents, a Google spokesperson told Business Insider: “We’re constantly experimenting with new ways to build agents that solve real-world problems for people and businesses, but we don’t have anything to share at this time.”
Smith isn’t Google’s first AI coding assistant, but the tool can plan and execute more workflows autonomously, according to two employees familiar with the tool. You have access to Google employee profiles so you can retrieve specific documents that you need to access manually.
Smith is also unique in that it is available through Google’s internal chat platform, two employees said.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin says agents are coming
Brin appeared at a town hall for salespeople in early March to talk about AI agents, according to attendees.
Brin, who has returned to the Google scene since 2023, emphasized how important AI agents have become and said they will be a big focus for Google this year. According to attendees, he hinted that the company was developing a tool similar to OpenClaw. I couldn’t tell if Brin was referring to Agent Smith or something else.
During the meeting, Google business chief Philip Schindler joked that he could tell when Brin’s representatives were responding to messages on his behalf.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai ramps up use of AI
Google leaders are increasing pressure on employees to use AI.
Some Google engineers were told last year that they were expected to use AI tools for coding. In recent months, some Google employees in non-technical roles told Business Insider that they were told that the use of AI was no longer encouraged, but expected.
In some cases, Googlers have been told that the implementation of AI will be factored into their performance reviews.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai told employees last year that it was important to bring AI within the company because competitors would do the same.
Some efforts to deploy AI tools are bottom-up. Employees in Google’s infrastructure organization are running another internal initiative called Project EAT to improve how they adopt and standardize AI tools across the company, Business Insider previously reported.
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