Zuckerbergs Meta Fails to Lure Top AI Talent from OpenAI Despite Offering $100 Million Packages

Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, has recently been on a hiring spree, actively seeking to assemble a new team focused on superintelligence by attracting top AI researchers from rival institutions. Reports indicate that Meta has offered lucrative compensation packages exceeding $100 million to employees from OpenAI and Google DeepMind to join a team led by former Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang, working alongside Zuckerberg.

OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, confirmed these claims during a podcast with his brother Jack Altman, which was released on Tuesday. However, he pointed out that Zuckerberg’s initiatives to recruit talent have largely fallen short, adding a few critical remarks about Meta’s efforts along the way. «Meta has started to extend incredibly generous offers to our employees, such as signing bonuses of $100 million, which surpass annual salaries. […] I’m very glad that none of our top talent has opted to accept his proposals so far,” Altman shared in the podcast.

Altman believes that employees recognize OpenAI as having greater potential to achieve general intelligence, which could render it a more valuable company in the long run. He also suggested that Meta’s focus on high compensation, rather than on the goal of achieving general intelligence, is unlikely to foster a strong corporate culture.

It has been reported that Meta attempted to recruit prominent OpenAI researcher Noam Brown and AI architect Kora Kavukcuoglu from Google, but both efforts were unsuccessful.

Altman emphasized that the culture of innovation at OpenAI has been a key factor in its success, noting that «Meta’s current efforts in AI have not performed as well as they had hoped.» While he respects many aspects of Meta’s work, he does not see it as a leader in innovation. Later in the podcast, Altman expressed the view that simply utilizing AI is not enough for companies; genuine innovation is needed to stay ahead.

Altman’s comments highlight significant challenges that Meta faces in establishing a successful superintelligence AI lab. Besides hiring Wang, Meta announced last week that it has made substantial investments in Wang’s former venture, Scale AI. The company has also succeeded in attracting several leading AI researchers, including Jack Ray from Google DeepMind and Johan Schalkwijk from Sesame AI. Nevertheless, considerable work remains ahead.

In the coming year, Meta will need to bolster its AI team while OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google DeepMind operate at full capacity. OpenAI is expected to release an open AI model in the coming months, which may further set back Meta in the AI race.

Later in the podcast, Sam Altman discussed a potential AI-powered social media news feed that could compete with Meta’s offerings. He expressed interest in exploring an application that uses AI to curate personalized news feeds based on user preferences, rather than relying on the default algorithmic feeds seen in traditional social media apps.

Reports indicate that OpenAI is developing a social networking app internally, while Meta is experimenting with an AI-driven social platform through its Meta AI application. However, some users appear to be confused about the app’s capabilities, reporting on the experience of having hyper-personalized chats with broad audiences.

Whether AI-driven social media will gain popularity remains to be seen. Meanwhile, Zuckerberg and Altman seem poised to engage in a competitive battle for AI talent.

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[Source](https://techcrunch.com/2025/06/17/sam-altman-says-meta-tried-and-failed-to-poach-openais-talent-with-100m-offers/)