The Rundown: Meta has reportedly successfully recruited four OpenAI researchers for its new superintelligence unit, including three from OAI’s Zurich office and one key contributor to the AI leader’s o1 reasoning model.
The details:
- Zuckerberg personally recruited Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov, and Xiaohua Zhai, the trio that established OpenAI’s Zurich operations last year.
- Meta also landed Trapit Bansal, a foundational contributor to OpenAI’s o1 reasoning model who worked alongside co-founder Ilya Sutskever.
- Sam Altman said last week that Meta had offered $100M bonuses in poaching attempts, but “none of OpenAI’s best people” had taken the offer.
- Beyer confirmed on X that the Zurich trio was joining Meta, but denied the reports of $100M signing bonuses, calling them “fake news”.
- Meta’s hiring spree comes after its $15B investment in Scale AI and poaching of its CEO Alexandr Wang to lead the new division.
Why it matters: Meta’s new superintelligence team is taking shape — and despite Altman’s commentary last week, at least four of his researchers are willing to make the move. With an influx of new talent from top labs and a clear willingness to spend at all costs, Meta’s first release from the new unit will be a fascinating one to watch.
Source: The Rundown
