Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta is once again shaking up its artificial intelligence unit: as Axios reports, the company is cutting some 600 roles from its so-called Superintelligence lab.
Meta AI chief Alexandr Wang noted in a memo that the company is looking to streamline the greater AI department.
“By reducing the size of our team, fewer conversations will be required to make a decision, and each person will be more load-bearing and have more scope and impact,” he wrote, as quoted by Axios.
It’s a notable new development, considering Zuckerberg has personally led an aggressive hiring spree earlier this year, trying to court AI talent by offering workers up to $1 billion, multi-year job contracts. (The company says it’s continuing to hire for its TBD Lab, which was created last month to work on next-generation AI models, and encouraging the culled Superintelligence workers to apply for other roles within Meta.)
Still, it’s a sign of turmoil at Meta, which has been swept up in the heated AI race, spending copious amounts to secure talent. In June, the company paid $15 billion for a 49 percent stake in Scale AI, appointing then-CEO Wang as the lead of its own AI efforts, and onboarding a number of the company’s 1,500 staffers.
In July, Zuckerberg announced Meta’s Superintelligence AI lab, as part of a poorly-defined effort to create a “personal superintelligence” that “helps you achieve your goals.”
Less than a month later, the Wall Street Journal reported that the company was freezing AI hiring as part of a “basic organizational planning” process. At the time, Meta split the Superintelligence team into four teams, including its TBD Lab. A separate AI safety-focused team, dubbed FAIR, will also be affected by the latest layoffs.
However, Zuckerberg couldn’t stay away from acquiring new talent, hiring Thinking Machines cofounder Andrew Tulloch earlier this month, as well as OpenAI research scientist Ananya Kumar, per Axios‘ sources.
In short, the company’s AI efforts have already gone through several major changes as Meta continues to stay relevant in the ongoing AI race. Just earlier this week, Meta announced it was entering a partnership with Blue Owl Capital as part of an enormous $27 billion AI data center project.
Executives have maintained that the latest cuts are a sign of capitulation on its AI efforts and that superintelligence remains a top priority.
Meanwhile, the industry is continuing to search for ways of generating revenue to start making up for billions of dollars in losses. Analysts are warning of a growing AI bubble that could burst at any moment, potentially taking down the US economy with it.
Whether Zuckerberg’s major bets on the tech and his burning desire to hire new talent will allow Meta to weather such a storm remains to be seen.
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