Luke Sernau, a senior software engineer at Google wrote a critique asserting that the internet search leader is losing its edge in artificial intelligence to the open-source community, where many independent researchers use AI technology to make rapid and unexpected advances.

In Sernau’s analysis, Google’s rivalry with startup OpenAI had distracted from the rapid developments being made in open-source technology. “We’ve done a lot of looking over our shoulders at OpenAI. Who will cross the next milestone? What will the next move be?” he wrote. “But the uncomfortable truth is, we aren’t positioned to win this arms race and neither is OpenAI. While we’ve been squabbling, a third faction has been quietly eating our lunch. I’m talking, of course, about open source.”