What Meta Did After Mira Murati Rejected Mark Zuckerberg's Offer To Buy Her Startup
Meta has been scrambling to catch up in the generative AI race. Zuckerberg reportedly approached Murati, former chief technology officer of OpenAI, and offered to buy her fledgling company.
When she declined, Meta CEO reportedly approached more than a dozen of the startup's employees, offering eye-popping packages to lure them away, The Wall Street Journal reported.
His chief target was Andrew Tulloch, a leading researcher and co-founder at Thinking Machines. Zuckerberg offered him a compensation package that could have been worth as much as $1.5 billion over six years, with bonuses and high-performing stock included.
Tulloch turned it down. None of his colleagues accepted Meta's offers either.
Last week, Mira Murati said her entire team refused Meta's proposals. "So far at Thinking Machines Lab, not a single person has taken the offer," she told Wired.
Meta reportedly made offers ranging from $200 million to $1 billion, structured as salary and stock options vested over four years. One researcher was offered $1 billion alone.
Meta spokesman Andy Stone dismissed the characterisation of the offer as "inaccurate and ridiculous," and said any compensation was tied to stock performance. He also denied that Meta is seeking to acquire Thinking Machines Lab.
Stone disputed that Meta had approached the entire team. "The details are off," he said. "This all begs the question, who is spinning this narrative and why?"
Zuckerberg has targeted OpenAI and alumni-led ventures. Meta has approached over 100 OpenAI employees and hired at least 10. On July 25, Mark Zuckerberg tapped Shengjia Zhao, a Chinese researcher who spent three years at OpenAI, to lead Meta's new superintelligence team.
Zuckerberg has also tried recruiting from Anthropic, the $170 billion AI startup founded by former OpenAI VP Dario Amodei. All seven of Anthropic's co-founders remain with the company.
So far, Meta has hired two employees from Anthropic - Joel Pobar and Anton Bakhtin - both of whom previously worked at Meta.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New Indian Express
2 minutes ago
- New Indian Express
Amid US tariff friction, India engages China and Russia in high-stakes diplomacy
NEW DELHI: As geopolitical tensions escalate over India's energy ties with Russia and new US tariffs on Indian goods, New Delhi is set to have high-level engagements with two of Washington's chief strategic rivals, China and Russia, within a single week. These parallel diplomatic efforts highlight India's need for a nuanced foreign policy calculus as it navigates a shifting global order. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is slated to visit India on August 18 for talks under the Special Representatives (SR) mechanism, a bilateral channel primarily aimed at managing and resolving the longstanding border dispute. National Security Advisor Ajit Doval will represent India. While the mechanism has been dormant in recent years due to post-Galwan tensions, this meeting is being viewed as a signal of intent from both sides to re-engage cautiously, but constructively. Wang is set to call on Prime Minister Narendra Modi as well. Relations between New Delhi and Beijing have been severely strained since the 2020 Galwan Valley clashes in eastern Ladakh. Wang Yi's visit may pave the way for a broader normalisation process and building of mutual trusts. More significantly, it sets the stage for a possible meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Tianjin on August 31, Modi's first visit to China in seven years.
Time of India
12 minutes ago
- Time of India
US is secretly tracking AI chip shipments from Nvidia, AMD, Dell and others: Here's why
Representative Image US authorities are secretly placing location tracking devices in certain shipments of advanced chips from companies like Nvidia, Dell, AMD, Nvidia among others, reports news agency Reuters. These tracking devices, the report which quotes people with direct knowledge of the matter says, are aimed to prevent these chip shipments from being illegally diverted to China. The tactic applies only to select shipments already under investigation, the sources said. The trackers are often hidden in packaging and, in some cases, inside the servers themselves. Some are roughly the size of a smartphone. The US Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security, Homeland Security Investigations, and the FBI are typically involved, the report says. They are used to detect whether AI chips are being sent to destinations under US export restrictions. Reuters report quotes officials who say the move is part of broader efforts to enforce curbs on China's access to advanced American semiconductors. The devices, the sources claim, can help build cases against individuals and companies that violate U.S. export rules. Location trackers have long been used by US law enforcement to monitor exports such as airplane parts. In recent years, they have been deployed to combat the illegal diversion of semiconductors. How chip makers responded Super Micro said it does not disclose its 'security practices and policies' and would not comment on tracking actions. Dell, on the other hand, said it was 'not aware of a US Government initiative to place trackers in its product shipments.' US-China tech tensions US, a leader in the global AI chip supply chain, has recently tightened export controls on China from 2022 to limit its military development. Similar restrictions apply to Russia. Proposals in the White House and Congress have suggested requiring location verification technology in chips to prevent diversion. China has criticized the restrictions as an attempt to suppress its growth. Last month, its cyberspace regulator called in Nvidia to discuss concerns over alleged 'backdoors' in its chips, a claim Nvidia has denied. Some Chinese resellers have reportedly said they inspect diverted shipments for trackers before delivery due to the risk of them being embedded. In a recent US Justice Department case, a co-conspirator told a defendant to 'look carefully' for trackers on servers containing Nvidia chips. AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
Time of India
18 minutes ago
- Time of India
Passwords under threat as tech giants seek tougher security
By Mona Guichard Paris: Fingerprints, access keys and facial recognition are putting a new squeeze on passwords as the traditional computer security method -- but also running into public hesitancy. "The password era is ending," two senior figures at Microsoft wrote in a July blog post. The tech giant has been building "more secure" alternatives to log in for years -- and has since May been offering them by default to new users. Many other online services -- such as artificial intelligence giant OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot -- require steps like entering a numerical code emailed to a user's known address before granting access to potentially sensitive data. "Passwords are often weak and people re-use them" across different online services, said Benoit Grunemwald, a cybersecurity expert with Eset. Sophisticated attackers can crack a word of eight characters or fewer within minutes or even seconds, he pointed out. And passwords are often the prize booty in data leaks from online platforms, in cases where "they are improperly stored by the people supposed to protect them and keep them safe," Grunemwald said. One massive database of around 16 billion login credentials amassed from hacked files was discovered in June by researchers from media outlet Cybernews. The pressure on passwords has tech giants rushing to find safter alternatives. Tricky switchover One group, the Fast Identity Online Alliance (FIDO) brings together heavyweights including Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and TikTok. The companies have been working on creating and popularising password-free login methods, especially promoting the use of so-called access keys. These use a separate device like a smartphone to authorise logins, relying on a pin code or biometric input such as a fingerprint reader or face recognition instead of a password. Troy Hunt, whose website Have I Been Pwned allows people to check whether their login details have been leaked online, says the new systems have big advantages. "With passkeys, you cannot accidentally give your passkey to a phishing site" -- a page that mimics the appearance of a provider such as an employer or bank to dupe people into entering their login details -- he said. But the Australian cybersecurity expert recalled that the last rites have been read for passwords many times before. "Ten years ago we had the same question... the reality is that we have more passwords now than we ever did before," Hunt said. Although many large platforms are stepping up login security, large numbers of sites still use simple usernames and passwords as credentials. The transition to an unfamiliar system can also be confusing for users. Passkeys have to be set up on a device before they can be used to log in. Restoring them if a PIN code is forgotten or trusted smartphone lost or stolen is also more complicated than a familiar password reset procedure. "The thing that passwords have going for them, and the reason that we still have them, is that everybody knows how to use them," Hunt said. Ultimately the human factor will remain at the heart of computer security, Eset's Grunemwald said. "People will have to take good care of security on their smartphone and devices, because they'll be the things most targeted" in future, he warned.
