TLDR : Meta, unable to buy strategic AI startups, hires top talents with lucrative offers to enhance its superintelligence efforts.
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Faced with competition and the race toward AGI, large companies no longer have the time to recruit juniors and train them internally. The AI world is experiencing significant turnover: recognized talents are being courted with substantial bonuses and astronomical salaries, as recently seen with Meta, which, unable to acquire strategic startups, is recruiting to strengthen its AI capabilities.
Missed Acquisitions
Since late 2024, Meta has engaged in a series of informal discussions to acquire gems in generative AI. Three names stand out: Safe Superintelligence (SSI, co-founded by Ilya Sutskever, Daniel Levy, two ex-OpenAI members, and Daniel Gross, entrepreneur and investor, just a year ago), Perplexity AI (AI search engine), and Thinking Machines Lab (created by Mira Murati, also ex-OpenAI). None of these initiatives came to fruition. According to The Verge and Bloomberg, the obstacles were numerous: excessively high valuations, founders' reluctance to give up their independence, and disagreements on the long-term vision.
Hiring at a High Price
Instead of giving up, Meta circumvented the obstacle. On June 12, the company recruited Alexandr Wang, founder of Scale AI, as part of an investment of approximately $14 billion, bringing the latter's valuation to over $29 billion. The goal: to create a new internal lab dedicated to "superintelligence." Alongside him, two iconic figures in the sector have joined the venture: Daniel Gross (co-founder of SSI) and Nat Friedman (former CEO of GitHub).
While Ilya Sutskever also declined Meta's job offer, all were reportedly enticed by an offer that included not only a stake in their venture capital firm NFDG and substantial bonuses, but also a degree of autonomy rarely granted in a company of this size. Note that this fund invests in leading AI startups, including Perplexity AI...
Sam Altman revealed in a podcast hosted by his brother that Meta had offered signing bonuses up to $100 million and even more substantial annual packages. None of the top OpenAI talents have accepted these proposals so far.