There's officially a talent war in AI - until this week I wouldn't use any word beyond 'competitive' to describe the situation - but these latest developments make 'war' totally appropriate.
Last week, Altman was a proud man with a faithful team...
He shared how other companies were after his top talent, but they weren't budging - "Meta has started making these, like, giant offers to a lot of people on our team” Sam Altman said on a podcast last week “You know, like, $100 million signing bonuses, more than that in compensation per year - and I’m really happy that, at least so far, none of our best people have decided to take him up on that"
He shared how other companies were after his top talent, but they weren't budging - "Meta has started making these, like, giant offers to a lot of people on our team” Sam Altman said on a podcast last week “You know, like, $100 million signing bonuses, more than that in compensation per year - and I’m really happy that, at least so far, none of our best people have decided to take him up on that"
Altman went on to say he believes Open AI’s culture of innovation is what has kept the top minds in AI there, and that Meta’s “current AI efforts have not worked as well as they hoped".
But here in Silicon Valley, things can change quickly...
There are reportedly 3 OpenAI staffers now heading to Meta - Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov, and Xiaohua Zhai — the team that ran OpenAI’s Zurich office. It appears the Zuck can indeed sway some minds.
Zuckerberg personally has been messaging top AI researchers on WhatsApp, and inviting his targets to dinners at his homes in Palo Alto and Lake Tahoe.
Meta also recently signed Scale AI’s CEO Alexandr Wang with a $14 billion investment, the 28-year-old is one of tech's most expensive hires ever, and there were no shortage of people who found these numbers insane.
This latest development only further underscores the escalating battle for AI's brightest minds, if I had to bet if the battle calms down from here, or grows into something much nastier, unfortunately, it' the latter.
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Author: Dalton Kline
Tech News CITY // Silicon Valley Newsroom
