Latest news with #SafeSuperintelligence
CNBC
a day ago
- Business
- CNBC
After Zuckerberg spent billions on an AI 'dream team,' he has to deliver for Meta shareholders
When Mark Zuckerberg feels the heat, he opens his wallet. The 41-year-old Facebook founder and Meta CEO is on a spending spree like never before in an effort to position his company at the forefront of the artificial intelligence boom and make up for recent costly mistakes in a market that's rapidly revolutionizing the business world. Following last week's stunning $14.3 billion investment in Scale AI, which brought with it Meta's hiring of the startup's founder, Alexandr Wang, and a small group of his top staffers, Meta now plans to hire former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman and his business partner, Daniel Gross, who had been CEO of $32 billion AI startup Safe Superintelligence, CNBC reported this week. Meta previously tried to buy Safe Superintelligence, which was launched a year ago by OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever, sources told CNBC. According to other sources, Meta had previously been in talks to buy Perplexity AI, which was valued at $14 billion in a funding round in May. The people who spoke to CNBC about the various dealmaking pursuits asked not to be named due to confidentiality. Zuckerberg told investors at the top of the most recent earnings call in April, "The major theme right now, of course, is how AI is transforming everything we do." At the same time, Meta upped its capital expenditures range for the year to between $64 billion and $72 billion from between $60 billion and $65 billion to reflect more data center investments in AI and potentially higher hardware costs. What Zuckerberg didn't say then is that he was about to start shelling out mounds of cash to revamp his AI organization. "Mark Zuckerberg is in founder mode and he's not going to be stopped," said Gil Luria, an analyst at D.A. Davidson, in an interview on Friday with CNBC's "Money Movers." Luria has a buy rating on the stock, but said that to win in AI, Meta needs to be successful with the next round, with the dream team that they're building." At Meta, AI is being embedded across the company, from its core online advertising unit and Instagram algorithms to its effort to build the metaverse. Better AI models and technology enhance the company's existing business, both by improving ad targeting and by bringing down costs. However, the building of fundamental models used by the vast community of developers — where the company competes with Google, OpenAI, Anthropic and others — is where Meta is viewed by many as a laggard. Meta's unique open-source approach is built around the Llama family of models. Its most recent update in April, the Llama 4 AI models, was not well received by developers. At the time, Meta only released two smaller versions of Llama 4 and said it would eventually release a bigger and more powerful "Behemoth" model. "On the heels of a successful rollout of Llama 3 a year ago, Llama 4 that came out this year was an absolute failure, almost by his admission," Luria said, referring to Zuckerberg. "Meta can't afford to fail in having the leading AI model. So they're out in the marketplace desperately trying to replace their AI team right now." Meta didn't respond to a request for comment for this story. Bringing on Scale AI's Wang was Zuckerberg's most headline-grabbing move yet. While Meta is gaining a 49% stake in the startup, Zuckerberg's real prize in the deal was hiring Wang, a dropout from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who started his company at age 19. Zuckerberg then turned his attention to Github's Friedman and Gross, who have been investing together at their venture firm NFDG. They will work on products under Wang, one source familiar with the matter told CNBC on Thursday. Meta, meanwhile, will get a stake in NFDG, according to multiple sources. A Meta spokesperson didn't comment on the planned hires and said the company "will share more about our superintelligence effort and the great people joining this team in the coming weeks." Not all of Zuckerberg's recruits are costing billions of dollars. Some are in the tens or hundreds of millions. That's according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. Altman said on the latest episode of the "Uncapped" podcast, which his brother hosts, that Meta has tried to lure OpenAI employees by offering signing bonuses as high as $100 million, with even larger annual compensation packages. "I've heard that Meta thinks of us as their biggest competitor," Altman said on the podcast. "Their current AI efforts have not worked as well as they have hoped and I respect being aggressive and continuing to try new things." Meta technology chief Andrew Bosworth told CNBC's "Closing Bell Overtime" on Friday that Altman is countering the offers. "The market is setting a rate here for a level of talent which is really incredible and kind of unprecedented in my 20-year career as a technology executive," said Bosworth, who joined Meta in 2006. Wall Street is mostly giving Zuckerberg the benefit of the doubt, for now. Meta shares were flat this week after slipping about 2% last week. Shares are still up 17% for the year, outpacing the Nasdaq and all the company's megacap peers. Analysts at Argus maintained their buy recommendation on the stock this week and lifted their price target to $790 a share from $725 a share. The stock closed on Friday at $682.35. "The company's ability to capitalize on GenAI advances in advertising targeting is a particularly relevant opportunity to drive advertising spending, which is the company's lifeblood," the Argus analysts wrote. D.A. Davidson's Luria said that Zuckerberg has put more pressure on himself to turn Meta into a long-term AI leader, but said he won't bet against him. Luria said: "The last time Mr. Zuckerberg felt like he was under the gun," he snapped up Instagram for $1 billion, a deal that set the stage for Facebook to become a dominant player in mobile. That was in 2012, just as Facebook was about to hit the public market. Luria also highlighted Zuckerberg's controversial $19 billion purchase of WhatsApp two years later. He sees the Meta CEO making an equally bold wager in AI. "He's going to rebuild the team and they're going to come back," Luria said.
Mint
2 days ago
- Business
- Mint
Meta wanted to buy a $30 billion AI startup: report. What it is trying instead.
Meta Platforms stock has climbed this year in response to the social media company's progress with artificial-intelligence. Now, it is reportedly stepping up its efforts, trying to acquire a major AI start-up and recruiting new AI executives. Meta looked to buy Safe Superintelligence earlier this year but was rebuffed by its founder Ilya Sutskever, CNBC reported late Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter. Safe Superintelligence was valued at $30 billion in a funding round in March. Meta and Safe Superintelligence didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. On the face of it, such an acquisition would have been an odd move. Safe Superintelligence hasn't released any products, as it concentrates on developing supersmart AI. Meta has also been getting along perfectly well on its own, with its stock up 19% so far this year. The real attraction of such a deal likely would have been to get Sutskever and his key employees on board. Sutskever was previously chief scientist at OpenAI, where he helped develop the technology behind ChatGPT. He left OpenAI last year following a break with its CEO Sam Altman, and subsequently launched Safe Superintelligence. Thwarted in his efforts to bring Sutskever on board, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has instead negotiated to recruit Safe Superintelligence's CEO Daniel Gross, as well as former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, according to CNBC. Gross and Friedman are partners in the investment fund NFDG, which has backed several AI start-ups. So far, Meta has relied on in-house AI models, as opposed to acquiring or funding an AI start-up as Microsoft has done with OpenAI and has with Anthropic. However, there have been signs that Zuckerberg feels Meta's AI team needs bolstering. Last week, Meta completed an investment in Scale AI. The Wall Street Journal reported that Meta would pump $14 billion into the data-labeling company in exchange for a 49% stake and that Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang would join Meta. The bigger picture here is that multiple AI companies have delayed the releases of their next flagship models amid concerns they don't show sufficient improvement. That suggests the industry's 'scaling law," the idea that larger and more complex models are automatically more intelligent, is breaking down. Meta is among those struggling to make a breakthrough. Its 'Behemoth" model, originally meant to be released in April, is being delayed until fall or later, according to the Journal. The response from AI companies has been the development of so-called reasoning models that break down problems step-by-step. However, a recent paper from researchers at Apple found 'fundamental limitations" in such models. At tasks beyond a certain level of complexity, these AIs suffered 'complete accuracy collapse," according to the researchers. That suggests the industry will need to adopt new techniques to push AI to the next level of intelligence. Meta will hope that its new recruits can get there first.
Axios
2 days ago
- Business
- Axios
Meta reportedly plans big new AI hires
Meta is in advanced talks to hire Daniel Gross and Nat Friedman as part of its new AI lab, per multiple reports. It also would take a stake in the pair's venture capital firm, NFDG. Why it matters: This would be the second time this month that Meta has poached the top exec of an AI decacorn, as Gross currently serves as CEO of Safe Superintelligence. Unlike the recent deal with Scale AI and Alexandr Wang, this one seems contentious. CNBC reports that Meta recently tried to acquire Safe Superintelligence but was rebuffed by founder Ilya Sutskever. Safe Superintelligence recently was valued at $32 billion in a Greenoaks-led round that also included Nvidia, Lightspeed, a16z, Alphabet, and DST Global. As we discussed in March 2024, this generation of AI founders seems unusually willing to leave their startups for incumbents. Zoom in: Meta, which has never had a corporate venture fund, would buy out limited partners in NFDG, per The Information.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
After trying to buy Ilya Sutskever's $32B AI startup, Meta looks to hire its CEO
Mark Zuckerberg's AI talent hiring spree continues. In recent months, Meta tried to acquire Safe Superintelligence, the $32 billion AI startup co-founded by OpenAI's former chief scientist, Ilya Sutskever, according to a report from CNBC on Thursday. Sutskever ultimately turned Meta down, according to CNBC, but the company is now in talks to hire Safe Superintelligence's co-founder and CEO, Daniel Gross. Earlier this week, The Information reported that Meta was in talks to hire Gross, as well as former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman. Meta is also reportedly taking a stake in Friedman and Gross's joint venture firm, NFDG, which has invested in prominent AI startups such as Perplexity and Gross and Friedman could significantly beef up Meta's AI superintelligence lab, adding leaders who have experience running and investing in AI research labs. Earlier this month, Meta announced that Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang, and several executives from the data labeling startup, would join the company as well. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
TechCrunch
2 days ago
- Business
- TechCrunch
After trying to buy Ilya Sutskever's $32B AI startup, Meta looks to hire its CEO
In Brief Mark Zuckerberg's AI talent hiring spree continues. In recent months, Meta tried to acquire Safe Superintelligence, the $32 billion AI startup co-founded by OpenAI's former chief scientist, Ilya Sutskever, according to a report from CNBC on Thursday. Sutskever ultimately turned Meta down, according to CNBC, but the company is now in talks to hire Safe Superintelligence's co-founder and CEO, Daniel Gross. Earlier this week, The Information reported that Meta was in talks to hire Gross, as well as former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman. Meta is also reportedly taking a stake in Friedman and Gross's joint venture firm, NFDG, which has invested in prominent AI startups such as Perplexity and Gross and Friedman could significantly beef up Meta's AI superintelligence lab, adding leaders who have experience running and investing in AI research labs. Earlier this month, Meta announced that Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang, and several executives from the data labeling startup, would join the company as well.
