All the President's men
When the world's second richest man, Meta's Zuckerberg, was displeased with the revelations of an ex-employee, Sarah Wynn-Williams, on unsavoury behaviour inside the company, he tried to prevent Wynn-Williams' tell-all book, Careless People from being sold in the US (it had already appeared in the UK).
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Time of India
17 minutes ago
- Time of India
Meta builds AI superintelligence lab, eyes $10 billion deal with Scale AI's Alexandr Wang
Why Meta's betting big on Wang and Scale AI Live Events Zuckerberg's long game: From early losses to AI powerhouse AI arms race: The billion-dollar club What's already in motion at Meta (You can now subscribe to our (You can now subscribe to our Economic Times WhatsApp channel Meta is setting up a new artificial intelligence research lab with a bold goal: to develop 'superintelligence,' a system that could surpass human cognitive abilities. The news, first reported by The New York Times, marks Meta's most ambitious AI project to the centre of this effort is Alexandr Wang , the 28-year-old founder and CEO of Scale AI. He is expected to play a leading role in the new lab's operations. Meta is also in advanced discussions to invest over $10 billion in his start-up, according to a separate report by Bloomberg. The deal may also see a number of Scale AI staff transition to companies declined to comment on the has emerged as one of the most prominent figures in the AI industry. His company, Scale AI, supplies data infrastructure essential for training large language models — the same kind used in AI systems like ChatGPT. His addition to Meta's team reflects a larger recruitment drive by the tech to sources cited by The New York Times, Meta has offered compensation packages ranging from seven to nine figures to top researchers from rivals like Google and OpenAI. Some have already agreed to come on push to hire top AI minds comes amid internal challenges. The company has faced management struggles, employee churn and several underwhelming product launches in its AI division, two of the people familiar with the matter told the Zuckerberg, Meta's chief executive, is not new to the AI race. After losing a bid to acquire DeepMind in 2013 — a key moment that propelled Google's AI efforts — he launched Meta's first dedicated AI lab the same year. Since then, Meta has invested heavily in AI, building tools for content moderation, recommendation engines, and now, generative sees 2025 as a turning point. 'AI is potentially one of the most important innovations in history,' he said in February. 'This year is going to set the course for the future.'Meta has earmarked up to $65 billion for capital spending on AI infrastructure this year is not the only tech firm placing massive bets on AI. Microsoft has invested over $13 billion in OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT. Amazon has pumped $8 billion into Anthropic, while Google paid $3 billion last year to license technology and recruit talent from a start-up known for its conversational companies are all chasing artificial general intelligence (AGI), a system that can replicate human intelligence across any domain. Meta, however, is setting its sights even higher — superintelligence , which would go beyond AGI in both scope and superintelligence remains a theoretical goal, it's considered by leading researchers to be the ultimate destination for AI before the formation of this new lab, Meta had begun rolling out AI products at scale. Last month, the company revealed that its AI assistant now supports over a billion monthly active users across apps like Facebook, Instagram, and February, CNBC reported that Meta was preparing to launch a stand-alone Meta AI app in the second quarter, along with a paid-subscription model similar to OpenAI's the high costs and intense competition, Meta appears determined to lead the next wave of AI innovation — and with Wang on board, it's signalling that this ambition is more than just stakes are clear. If Meta succeeds, it won't just catch up to its rivals — it could redefine the field. With billions in play, the hiring of Wang, and a lab focused on the frontier of AI capabilities, Meta is gambling big on a future where machines might not just match human minds — but exceed the industry, and for users around the world, the outcome of this gamble will shape the direction of technology for years to come.
Time of India
2 hours ago
- Time of India
Byju's fire sale; Meesho's pre-IPO move
Byju's fire sale; Meesho's pre-IPO move Also in the letter: Byju's sells American assets Epic, Tynker for a song Fire sale: Epic, Byju's second-largest acquisition with a $500-million price tag in 2022, has been sold to China's TAL Education Group for $95 million. CodeHS, a computer science education company, has bought Tynker for $2.2 million in cash. Byju's had acquired it in 2021 in a cash-and-stock deal worth $200 million. Leading to the sale: In June 2024, a group of lenders from the consortium that loaned $1.2 billion to Byju's filed a petition in a US court seeking bankruptcy proceedings against its subsidiaries Epic, Tynker and Osmo, ET had reported. The court approved the sale of Epic and Tynker in an order dated May 20. Lots of litigations: Meesho converts to public entity in run-up to IPO Future proofing: Homecoming: Meesho has also applied to the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) to shift its domicile from the US back to India. Last month, the SoftBank-backed etailer got board approval to rename its Indian entity, Fashnear Technologies Pvt Ltd, to Meesho Pvt Ltd. Following the 'reverse flip', Meesho Ltd will become the parent company of the online marketplace. Operational metrics: Meesho recorded 34% year-on-year growth in orders, reaching 1.3 billion in nine months to December 2024. As of December 2024, the platform had 187 million unique annual transacting users, representing a 26% increase from the previous year. Sponsor ETtech Top 5 & Morning Dispatch! Why it matters: The opportunity: Reach a highly engaged audience of decision-makers. Boost your brand's visibility among the tech-savvy community. Custom sponsorship options to align with your brand's goals. What's next: Meta's Mark Zuckerberg is hiring for new AI team: Report Driving the news: Zuckerberg plans to personally hire 50 people, including a new head of AI research. The move, the report added, follows internal dissatisfaction with the reception of Meta's Llama 4 model. Meta's proposed $10 billion investment in Scale AI could also see the AI startup's founder, Alexandr Wang, joining Meta's AGI team once the deal is finalised. Tell me more: Meta has delayed the release of its flagship "Behemoth" AI model, reportedly due to concerns about its capabilities, according to The Wall Street Journal. OpenAI, Meta's closest rival in the AGI race, is also actively seeking fresh investment to accelerate its own efforts. Also Read: OpenAI's annualised revenue hits $10 billion, up from $5.5 billion in December 2024 What does this mean? The company is on track to meet its 2025 revenue target of $12.7 billion, as outlined to investors. OpenAI lost nearly $5 billion last year, but its current revenue run rate highlights just how far ahead it is of its competitors. Turf war in the clouds showers on the ground Babyscalers vs hyperscalers: Neocloud firms, often called babyscalers, are boutique operators focused on flexible GPU rentals and specialised infrastructure. Hyperscalers, in contrast, offer vast computing, storage and networking capacity at scale. The underdogs are winning on price. Renting an Nvidia DGX H100 GPU system from a hyperscaler costs around $98 an hour. A babyscaler charges just $34, roughly two-thirds cheaper. Investors' darlings: Everything Apple announced at its annual developer conference New features: At WWDC, Apple launched iOS 26 and integrated Apple Intelligence across its apps and devices. The company also introduced a new display technology, 'liquid glass'. The Phone app now offers smart screening, automatic hold, and optional call answering. Messages is getting a refresh too, with features like custom chat backgrounds. Apple is also introducing generative AI to Xcode, its developer tool, to assist with writing, testing, and debugging code. Support for third-party models, such as ChatGPT, is forthcoming. Updates availability: Troubled edtech startup Byju's is selling its US assets at steep losses, mandated by a US bankruptcy court. This and more in today's ETtech Top 5.■ Meta's AGI scramble■ Enter the Babyscalers■ Coming soon: iOS 26Embattled edtech firm Byju's is being forced to offload American assets , Epic and Tynker, at steep losses following an order from a US bankruptcy court. US lawsuit filed on April 10 against Byju's eponymous founder, Byju Raveendran, his wife Divya Gokulnath, and former company executive Anita Kishore, alleged they misappropriated $533 million from the funds lent to the group's special purpose financing vehicle, Byju's Alpha. In October last year , a Delaware Bankruptcy Court found that suspended director Riju Raveendran had violated his fiduciary responsibilities as a director of Byju's board has approved converting the company from a private limited entity to a public limited one. The move is a key step for the ecommerce firm's plans to list in the Meesho board has not cleared an IPO yet, the company said in a filing with the Registrar of Companies (RoC) that it 'intends to maintain readiness from a regulatory and compliance perspective to enable such an offering when deemed appropriate.'ETtech Top 5 and Morning Dispatch are must-reads for India's tech and business leaders, including startup founders, investors, policy makers, industry insiders and Reach out to us at spotlightpartner@ to explore sponsorship Zuckerberg, CEO, MetaMeta chief Mark Zuckerberg is assembling a team to develop artificial general intelligence (AGI), an AI system designed to match or surpass human capabilities, Bloomberg said on Monday that its annualised revenue reached $10 billion as of June , doubling from December 2024, driven by soaring enterprise and developer AI adoption.'Babyscalers' like Coreweave, Lambda Labs, Crusoe, and Nebius are taking on hyperscalers such as Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure, offering more competitive pricing and specialised neocloud firms chip away at the dominants of the giants, Indian data centres are positioning themselves to capitalise on the shift in global cloud lower cost of power and space has made babyscalers a magnet for private equity. Blackstone, Carlyle, and BlackRock have collectively invested $11 billion into this emerging Street banks have built a growing debt market around these forms. Babyscalers tap these funds to bulk-buy Nvidia chips, then lease them out by the hour or month to AI companies and unveiled a wave of major software updates on Monday at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), introducing revamped visuals, a new naming convention, and powerful tools under its Apple Intelligence suite. iOS 26 will be available as a free update for iPhone 11 and newer models, including the 12, 13, 14, 15, and 16 series.
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Business Standard
2 hours ago
- Business Standard
Meta launches AI lab to pursue superintelligence with Scale AI founder
Meta is preparing to unveil a new artificial intelligence research lab dedicated to pursuing 'superintelligence,' a hypothetical A.I. system that exceeds the powers of the human brain, as the tech giant jockeys to stay competitive in the technology race, according to four people with the knowledge of the company's plans. Meta has tapped Alexandr Wang, 28, the founder and chief executive of the A.I. start-up Scale AI, to join the new lab, the people said, and has been in talks to invest billions of dollars in his company as part of a deal that would also bring other Scale AI employees to the company. Meta has offered seven- to nine-figure compensation packages to dozens of researchers from leading A.I. companies such as OpenAI and Google, with some agreeing to join, according to the people. The new lab is part of a larger reorganization of Meta's A.I. efforts, the people said. The company, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has recently grappled with internal management struggles over the technology, as well as employee churn and several product releases that fell flat, two of the people said. Mark Zuckerberg, Meta's chief executive, has invested billions of dollars into turning his company into an A.I. powerhouse. Since OpenAI released the ChatGPT chatbot in 2022, the tech industry has raced to build increasingly powerful A.I. Mr. Zuckerberg has pushed his company to incorporate A.I. across its products, including in its smart glasses and a recently released app, Meta AI. Staying in the race is crucial for Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft, with the technology likely to be the future for the industry. The giants have pumped money into start-ups and their own A.I. labs. Microsoft has invested more than $13 billion in OpenAI, while Amazon has plowed $8 billion into the A.I. start-up Anthropic. The behemoths have also spent billions to hire employees from high-profile start-ups and license their technology. Last year, Google agreed to pay $3 billion to license technology and hire technologists and executives from a start-up that builds chatbots for personal conversations. In February, Mr. Zuckerberg, 41, called A.I. 'potentially one of the most important innovations in history.' He added, 'This year is going to set the course for the future.' Meta and Scale AI declined to comment. Superintelligence is regarded by leading researchers to be a futuristic goal of A.I. development. OpenAI, Google and others have said their immediate aim is to build 'artificial general intelligence,' or A.G.I., shorthand for a machine that can do anything the human brain can do, which is an ambition with no clear path to success. Superintelligence, if it can be developed, would go beyond A.G.I. in its power. Meta has invested in A.I. for more than a decade. Mr. Zuckerberg created the company's first dedicated A.I. lab in 2013, after losing out to Google in trying to acquire a seminal start-up called DeepMind. DeepMind is now the core of Google's A.I. efforts.
