Google founder to employees at town hall: This year a big role will be played by AI agents

Google employees have been buzzing about a new internal tool called Agent Smith, named after the antagonist in The Matrix. The tool is created to automate various tasks such as coding, run asynchronously in the background, and even be accessed via mobile phones. According to a report by Business Insider, the tool became so popular within the organisation that Google had to restrict access in order to manage demand. Designed on Google’s existing agentic coding platform Antigravity, Agent Smith interacts with various internal tools and can autonomously plan and execute workflows. Unlike earlier assistants, it can pull up documents linked to employee profiles and be used directly from Google’s internal chat platform.

Google cofounder Sergey Brin’s message to employees

As per the BI reports, at a recent town hall with sales employees, Google cofounder Sergey Brin also stressed on the fact that AI agents will be a major focus for Google in 2026. Brin, who returned to hands-on work at Google in 2023, said agents represent the next big leap in productivity. Along with this, he also hinted at tools similar to “OpenClaw,” though it’s unclear if he was referring to Agent Smith or another project.In the same meeting, Google’s business chief Philipp Schindler also joked that he could tell when Brin’s agent was responding to messages on his behalf underscoring how deeply these tools are already being integrated into workflows.

AI adoption becoming mandatory at Google

Google’s leadership, including CEO Sundar Pichai, has been pressing employees to adopt AI tools across technical and non-technical roles. In some cases, usage of AI is now factored into performance reviews. Engineers were told last year that AI adoption was expected, and more recently, non-technical staff have been given the same directive.Beyond top-down mandates, employees themselves are experimenting with initiatives like Project EAT, aimed at standardizing AI adoption across Google’s infrastructure teams.The comments made by Brin highlight the boarder industry trend as Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is also reportedly building his own AI agent to help run the company, while other tech giants are racing to embed agentic AI into daily operations.