Who are Character.AI's decision-makers?
Character.AI is led by Dominic Perella; other important leaders include Erin Teague, Noam Shazeer, Daniel De Freitas.
- CEO
- Dominic Perella
- Key exec
- Erin Teague
- Founded
- 2021
- Employees
- ~100 after 2024 Google licensing deal
- HQ
- Menlo Park, CA
- Notable
- Character creation
- Dominic PerellaCEOsince 2024Took over after founders returned to Google.
- Erin TeagueChief Product Officersince 2024Former Google/YouTube/Gemini product leader.
- Noam ShazeerCo-founder; former CEO2021-2024Returned to Google in 2024; reported moving to OpenAI in 2026.
- Daniel De FreitasCo-founder2021-2024Former Google LaMDA researcher.
Who leads Character.AI?
Dominic Perella serves as CEO; Erin Teague serves as Chief Product Officer; Noam Shazeer serves as Co-founder; former CEO; Daniel De Freitas serves as Co-founder. This mix of founder, product, research, and operating leadership defines how the company prioritizes product roadmaps and major vendor decisions.
Who actually makes buying decisions at Character.AI?
For most vendors, the buying committee is functional: infrastructure, product, security, legal, procurement, finance, and go-to-market leaders. CEO approval matters for strategic partnerships, compute commitments, acquisitions, or tools that touch core model/product strategy.
How is Character.AI organized as it scales?
At this stage, Character.AI is likely organized across product, engineering, infrastructure, sales/partnerships, trust or safety, and finance. Sellers should identify the workflow owner first, then map executive sponsorship only when the deal is strategic.
As of June 2026.Sources:Character.AIFinancial Times Character.AI pivotAxios Character.AI Google deal
Character.AI — frequently asked questions
