Negotiations between Google WIRED has learned that DeepMind and its London workers’ prospects for unionization stumbled this week after initial talks left union officials feeling they had wasted their time.
In May, DeepMind employees he asked Google will recognize the Communication Workers Union and Union Union as joint representatives. The company later denied this request but agreed to participate in negotiations led by a third-party body.
Wednesday’s preliminary meeting was attended by union officials, DeepMind employees involved in unionization efforts, an external arbitrator and DeepMind HR representatives. Unionization advocates were frustrated by DeepMind’s lack of leadership.
“The absence of senior management at the opening stage for recognition confirmation discussions is a leading indicator that the company is not engaging in good faith. It is simply a waste of time,” according to John Chadfield, a CWU official who attended the meeting. “Negotiations stalled at an early stage.”
DeepMind denies that negotiations are deadlocked. “The first step in this process is to determine who the unions want to represent, and the parties have agreed on next steps to do so,” says Al Verney, a spokesman for Google DeepMind. “Appropriate representatives attended this initial meeting.”
During the meeting, a DeepMind employee read a prepared letter on behalf of colleagues supporting the formation of trade unions, verified by WIRED. “Instead of engaging in constructive dialogue with employees about our concerns, Google DeepMind employees were treated as if the problem had been delegated to HR,” the letter reads. According to multiple sources with knowledge of the meeting, an employee reading the statement was interrupted twice by DeepMind HR representatives.
The letter goes on to allege that Google attempted to stifle open dialogue among DeepMind employees and stifle dissent by closing or reconfiguring internal chats and preventing employees from responding to company-wide communications regarding the unionization offer. The letter alleges that employees who tried to bypass the restrictions were “punished” by HR.
“The goal was to intimidate,” says a DeepMind employee involved in drafting the letter, who asked to remain anonymous because he is not authorized to talk to the media. “These are well-established union-busting techniques.”
“We will continue to engage constructively in the… process and maintain an open dialogue with employees,” Verney says. “On topics other than these, we continue to offer employees many other channels and opportunities to discuss their views.”
The push for a union at DeepMind began in February 2025, when Google’s parent company Alphabet lien removed not to exploit AI for purposes such as weapons development and surveillance, in line with ethical guidelines, as WIRED previously reported.
“These principles were a big part of why I joined DeepMind,” says a second DeepMind employee who asked to remain anonymous for the same reason. “We basically just got rid of them all.”