Meta is hunting top AI talent with massive pay packages — Zuckerberg is going all in.
The Meta CEO spent months assembling a list of elite AI engineers and researchers worldwide. His goal: lure them away from rivals like OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft with compensation deals reportedly reaching $100 million.
Zuckerberg has been personally reaching out to candidates, according to the Wall Street Journal. 
The move comes amid Meta’s AI push after delaying the launch of its flagship model, Behemoth. Meta also invested $14 billion for a stake in Scale AI, promoting 28-year-old founder Alexandr Wang to lead its "superintelligence team," focused on building AI smarter than humans.
The “list” includes fresh PhD grads from Berkeley and Carnegie Mellon, many currently working at Meta’s rivals. Zuckerberg’s approach involves combing research papers and forming a WhatsApp group chat, “Recruiting Party,” with other Meta execs to coordinate hires.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman slammed the recruitment tactics, calling the huge signing bonuses “crazy.”
Sam Altman stated:
“I’m really happy that, at least so far, none of our best people have decided to take them up on that.”
“I think the strategy of a ton of upfront, guaranteed comp, and that being the reason you tell someone to join, like really the degree to which they’re focusing on that and not the work and not the mission, I don’t think that’s going to set up a great culture.”
Meta’s aggressive talent grab is turning the AI hiring war into a full-on arms race.
