"Wang and other former Scale staffers have struggled with some of the idiosyncratic ways of working at Meta, according to someone familiar with his thinking, for example having to adjust to not having revenue goals as they once did as a startup. Despite teething problems, some have celebrated the leadership shift, including the appointment of popular entrepreneur and venture capitalist Friedman as head of Products and Applied Research, the team tasked with integrating the models into Meta's own apps."
"Going forward, Meta is weighing potential cuts to the AI team, one person said. In a memo shared with managers last week, seen by the Financial Times, Meta said that it was "temporarily pausing hiring across all [Meta Superintelligence Labs] teams, with the exception of business critical roles." Wang's staff would evaluate requested hires on a case-by-case basis, but the freeze "will allow leadership to thoughtfully plan our 2026 headcount growth as we work through our strategy," the memo said."
Meta reorganized its AI operations by elevating Wang into a central leadership role and having Yann LeCun report to him. Friedman was appointed head of Products and Applied Research to integrate models into Meta apps, and Zhao was hired as a decisive technical leader. Some former Scale staffers have struggled to adapt to Meta's non-revenue-driven startup practices. Ahmad Al-Dahle has not been named head of any team, and Cox remains chief product officer but no longer oversees generative AI. Meta claims TBD Labs has the greatest compute-per-researcher and is temporarily pausing Superintelligence Labs hiring while planning 2026 headcount.
Read at Ars Technica
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