Silicon Valley is witnessing one of its most intense hiring battles as Meta aggressively targets AI talent from OpenAI. Mark Zuckerberg isn’t holding back. His new Meta Superintelligence Lab is quickly filling up with top researchers, many freshly poached from OpenAI. Recent exits include Shengjia Zhao, Jiahui Yu, Hongyu Ren, and Shuchao Bi, whose OpenAI Slack accounts reportedly went inactive overnight.
“I feel a visceral feeling right now, as if someone has broken into our home and stolen something,” wrote Mark Chen, OpenAI’s Chief Research Officer, in a memo seen by WIRED.
The offers coming from Meta have raised eyebrows across the AI world. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman confirmed the situation, saying on his brother’s podcast, “They’ve started making these giant offers to a lot of people on our team.” He added that some signing bonuses have reached as high as $100 million. “I’m really happy that, at least so far, none of our best people have decided to take him up on that,” Altman added.
Inside OpenAI, retaining top talent has become critical. Chen assured employees, “Please trust that we haven’t been sitting idly by.” The company is revising salaries to stay competitive but continues to rely on its mission to keep employees loyal. Altman took a dig at Meta’s efforts, saying, “Meta’s current AI efforts have not worked as well as they hoped. It’s not enough to catch up—you have to actually innovate.”
Meanwhile, Zuckerberg has made his ambitions clear. In an internal memo obtained by CNBC, he wrote, “Developing superintelligence is coming into sight. I believe this will be the beginning of a new era for humanity.” To lead the push, he has appointed Alexandr Wang, former CEO of Scale AI, as Meta’s Chief AI Officer, alongside ex-GitHub CEO Nat Friedman.
Meta’s new AI team now boasts former engineers from Google, DeepMind, Anthropic, and OpenAI. Notable names include Jack Rae and Pei Sun, key contributors to Google’s Gemini models, and Bi and Zhao, who worked on OpenAI’s GPT-4o. Zuckerberg believes Meta has a strong edge with its computing power, global scale, and “bold” company culture. He also promised to work on open-source AI models, aiming for “personal superintelligence for everyone.”
Still, not everything is smooth inside Meta. CTO Andrew Bosworth admitted, “The market is setting a rate here for a level of talent which is really incredible and kind of unprecedented.” There are also concerns that offering huge sums to a few could create tensions or stall projects.
The fight for AI talent is fierce, with Google, Microsoft, Anthropic, Meta, and OpenAI all chasing the same small pool of experts. Meta’s failed attempt to acquire Safe Superintelligence, founded by OpenAI’s Ilya Sutskever, shows how far companies will go to stay ahead.
Zuckerberg remains determined. “We’re still forming this group and we’ll ask several people across the AI org to join this lab as well,” he wrote to staff. “I’m optimistic that this new influx of talent… will set us up to deliver on the promise of personal superintelligence for everyone.”
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