David Luan Resigns: Amazon AI Lab Head, Who Led Company’s ‘Nova Act’ Agent and R&D Lab in San Francisco, Submits Resignation
David Luan, head of Amazon’s AI Lab, has announced his departure to start a new venture. Joining via the Adept acquisition, Luan led the development of the Nova Act agent. His exit marks a leadership transition to Peter DeSantis as Amazon continues to compete with OpenAI and Google in AGI research.
Mumbai, February 25: David Luan, the head of Amazon’s Artificial Intelligence Lab and a key figure in the company’s autonomous agent research, has announced his departure from the e-commerce and cloud computing giant. Luan, who joined Amazon following the 2024 "acqui-hire" of his startup Adept, confirmed via a LinkedIn post that he will leave his position at the end of this week to pursue a new project focused on advanced AI capabilities.
The departure marks a significant shift for Amazon’s San Francisco-based AI Lab, which focuses on long-term research and the development of "AI agents" capable of performing complex tasks. Peter DeSantis, Amazon’s Vice President of Utility Computing, is expected to oversee the team following Luan’s exit. WiseTech Global Layoffs: Australian Software Company To Cut 2,000 Jobs in Major Strategic Shift Towards Artificial Intelligence, Ends Manual Coding.
Luan noted on LinkedIn post that the lab successfully scaled agent training techniques originally developed at Adept, applying reinforcement learning research to benefit AWS customers including Hertz and 1Password. He highlighted the success of Nova Act, which recently reached the top of agent research leaderboards such as REALBench, as a point of professional satisfaction.
Background and Industry Influence
David Luan joined Amazon in June 2024 alongside other Adept co-founders and employees in a deal structured to bring top-tier talent to Amazon’s internal AI efforts. Before founding Adept, Luan served as a senior leader at OpenAI, where he helped incubate the first GPT models. His work has been central to the current industry focus on "computer-use" AI, where systems interact directly with software interfaces.
In his exit statement, Luan expressed gratitude toward Amazon executives, including CEO Andy Jassy and AWS head Matt Garman. He indicated that the proximity of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) influenced his decision to move on, stating a desire to spend his time teaching AI systems "brand new capabilities."
Future Implications for Amazon AI
The leadership change comes at a time when global technology firms are engaged in an intense race to dominate the AI agent market. While Luan’s departure removes a high-profile researcher from the firm, he maintained that the team remains in a strong position to continue its work on the Nova model ecosystem. OpenAI Wins Dismissal of xAI Trade Secrets Lawsuit Over Former Employee Hires, Says ‘We Welcome the Court’s Decision’.
Industry analysts suggest that Luan’s move to "cook up something new" reflects the high mobility of talent within the AI sector, where top researchers frequently exit large corporations to found independent ventures. Amazon has not yet provided further details on long-term leadership plans for the San Francisco lab beyond the transition to DeSantis.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 25, 2026 03:50 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).