Apple loses top AI executive to Meta's hiring spree
Pang Ruoming, a distinguished engineer and manager in charge of the company's Apple foundation models team, is departing, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
Mr Pang, who joined Apple from Google parent Alphabet in 2021, is the latest big hire for Meta's new superintelligence group, said the people. To secure Mr Pang, Meta offered a package worth tens of millions of dollars per year, the people said.
Meta chief executive officer Mark Zuckerberg has been on a hiring spree, bringing on major AI leaders including Scale AI's Alexandr Wang, start-up founder Daniel Gross and former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman with high compensation.
Meta on July 7 also hired Li Yuanzhi, a researcher from OpenAI, and Anton Bakhtin, who worked on Claude, the AI assistant built by at Anthropic, according to other people with knowledge of the matter. In June, Meta hired a slew of other OpenAI researchers.
At Meta, Mr Zuckerberg has made AI the company's top priority as it races to keep pace with rivals like OpenAI and Google. Mr Zuckerberg has been heavily involved in recruiting for the company's AI division, hosting potential hires at his homes in Silicon Valley and Lake Tahoe, and often reaching out personally to potential recruits.
Mr Zuckerberg restructured the company's AI teams at the end of June to better focus on 'superintelligence,' or AI technology that can complete tasks as well as or even better than humans. Meta will spend tens of billions of dollars on AI-related efforts this year, the company has announced, with much of that money going toward infrastructure like data centres and chips.
Top stories
Swipe. Select. Stay informed.
World 25% on Japan and Malaysia, 40% on Laos: Trump's tariff letters to Asia add pressure for deals by Aug 1
Business US stocks knocked lower by tariff jitters; Musk's political plan hits Tesla
World Netanyahu says has nominated Trump for Nobel Peace Prize
Singapore Fastest charger to be added to Singapore's EV charging network by Q4 in 2025
Singapore Singapore's second mufti Sheikh Syed Isa Semait dies at age 87
Singapore Fewer marriages in Singapore in 2024; greater marital stability for recent unions
Singapore Competition watchdog gives SIA, Malaysia Airlines conditional approval to continue cooperation
Singapore Eligible S'poreans to get up to $850 in GSTV cash, up to $450 in MediSave top-ups in August
At Apple, Mr Pang had been running a roughly 100-person team responsible for the company's large language models, which underpin Apple Intelligence and other AI features on the company's devices. In June, Apple announced that those models would be opened up to third-party developers for the first time, allowing for a range of new iPhone and iPad apps.
But internally, the foundation models team has come under scrutiny from new leadership, which is exploring the use of third-party models, including from either OpenAI or Anthropic, to power a new version of Siri. Those internal discussions have soured some of the morale on the foundation models team, also known as AFM, in recent weeks.
While the company has explored a move to a third-party solution to power the AI in the new Siri, it has simultaneously been working on a new version of Siri based on the models developed by Mr Pang's group. Those models also power Apple Intelligence features that run on Apple devices including email and web article summaries, Genmoji and Priority Notifications.
The major departure, the most significant in Apple's AI ranks since the company started working on Apple Intelligence a few years ago, underscores the heightened competition for talent in the emerging space. Meta has been making offers to the world's top engineers worth many millions of dollars per year – significantly more than what the iPhone maker pays its engineers doing similar work.
Mr Pang's departure could be the start of a string of exits from the AFM group, with several engineers telling colleagues they are planning to leave in the near future to Meta or elsewhere, the people said. Tom Gunter, a top deputy to Mr Pang, left Apple in June.
The foundation models team reports to Daphne Luong, a top deputy to AI senior vice president John Giannandrea. Earlier this year, Mr Giannandrea was sidelined internally and saw Siri, robotics, Core ML and App Intents frameworks and other consumer product-related teams stripped from his command. That came after a poor response to Apple Intelligence and continued delays for new Siri features, including the ability to tap into user data to fulfill commands. BLOOMBERG
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Straits Times
a day ago
- Straits Times
Grab calls for voice samples from users to fine-tune app feature for the visually impaired
Find out what's new on ST website and app. Peter Lim, who is visually impaired, uses the AI voice assistant to book a Grab ride from his home to a nearby mall on July 18. SINGAPORE – Getting a ride to his destination became easier for Mr Peter Lim in June, after Grab rolled out a voice assistant powered by artificial intelligence (AI) on its app. Mr Lim, who is visually impaired, welcomed this development, since it meant he could book a ride simply by using his voice. However, the 59-year-old call centre operator said that booking a ride to some places, such as Kalidasa Avenue and Lim Ah Pin Road, still poses a challenge. The voice assistant has trouble at times understanding Singaporean speech patterns, so Mr Lim sometimes gives just the postal code of his destination. Recognising this, Grab launched an open call in late June for voice samples from its users to fine-tune its AI model. Built on OpenAI's GPT-4.1 large language model and fine-tuned with 80,000 voice samples provided by Grab employees, the model's accuracy in understanding Singaporean accents and names of places is already 89 per cent. But further work needs to be done to account for the numerous ways in which locations across Singapore can be pronounced. For instance, Hougang can be articulated with or without the letter 'h', while Clementi can be pronounced as 'Kle-man-tee' or 'Klair-men-tee'. While there is no target set on how many voice samples Grab wants to collect by Dec 31, it aims to bring the accuracy up to 95 per cent, a Grab spokesperson told The Sunday Times. 'This involves having a greater variety and volume of voice samples that vocalise places of interest in different pitches, tones, accents and styles,' said the spokesperson. The top 85 per cent most commonly selected locations in Singapore were chosen for the invited voice samples from users. 'Participants will be shown a randomised selection of places of interest from this list for them to vocalise the names accordingly,' said the spokesperson. The company has already received nearly 10,000 voice recordings from users. The voice assistant has been helpful, especially when combined with the app's ability to suggest possible locations that the user might want to go to at different times of the day, said Mr Lim. ST PHOTO: GAVIN FOO Wallich Manor, 80 Dunbar Walk, and 31 Jalan Mutiara Latitude were among locations that this ST reporter was asked to record herself saying to improve speech pattern recognition on the app. The voice assistant has been helpful, especially when combined with the app's ability to suggest possible locations that the user might want to go to at different times of the day, said Mr Lim. 'It will ask me if I want to go home, or if I want to go to church on Sunday mornings. If I say no, I can tell it where I want to go instead,' he added. 'It is around 90 per cent accurate in understanding me so far.' The AI voice assistant is available to users with the talkback feature enabled on their phones. Members of the Singapore Association of the Visually Handicapped (SAVH) participated in focus group discussions and were involved in testing the feature before it was rolled out. Ms Lyn Loh, who heads SAVH's accessibility services department, said the voice assistant was initially not very responsive when given voice commands during the testing phase. It took a few tries for it to understand what she was saying. 'But now, it is much better,' said Ms Loh. The feature will be very useful if it can be used to order food delivery via the app as well, said Ms Loh, who added that she has given feedback to Grab about this. During the Covid-19 pandemic, she had to learn how to order food, as she could not see the markings pasted on floors and seats that dictated where people could queue and sit. 'We never know when the next pandemic will happen,' said Ms Loh. The voice assistant has trouble at times understanding Singaporean speech patterns. ST PHOTO: GAVIN FOO Grab also tested the feature's performance during the developmental phase by benchmarking it against Meralion – an AI model that can understand at least eight regional languages , and Singlish – developed by the A*Star Institute for Infocomm Research. 'While both models are designed for Singlish-speaking users, Meralion focuses on natural language understanding, while Grab's voice assistant is tailored specifically to help users identify locations and points of interest in Singapore,' said Grab's spokesperson. Recordings collected are encrypted and stored for a year in a secure server, and are not linked to any personal identifiers such as the user's name or mobile number, said the spokesperson. Mr Lim and Ms Loh expressed hope that this voice assistant will help not only the visually impaired, but also the elderly and people with physical disabilities. 'If it is improved, it can help many other people that just want to talk and not type,' said Mr Lim.
CNA
2 days ago
- CNA
India's financial crime fighting agency summons Google, Meta executives, sources say
India's financial crime fighting agency has summoned executives of tech giants Google and Meta to its headquarters on Monday as it investigates accusations of money laundering on online betting apps, two government sources said. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) is investigating whether the platforms eased the way for promotion and wider reach of betting apps through advertisements, the first source said. A date of July 21 has been set for the appearances at the agency's headquarters in the capital, New Delhi, the source added. A second government source accused Google and Meta of using their platforms to promote illegal activities, despite a government advisory against the advertisement of any form of betting. The agency will investigate Google and Meta over the funds they received from betting apps, the second source added, as well as checking if they were advertising or promoting any other betting platforms. Both sources sought anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to media. Google and Meta did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comment. Betting and gambling pose "significant financial and socio-economic risks for consumers, especially youth and children," India's information and broadcasting ministry told television channels and digital media in an advisory in 2022. Promotion of offline or online betting and gambling through advertisements was not advised in the larger public interest, the ministry added.
CNA
2 days ago
- CNA
India summons Google and Meta in betting app case, ANI reports
India's Enforcement Directorate agency, which probes economic crimes, has summoned representatives from Google and Meta to appear on Monday in connection with a case involving betting apps, ANI news agency reported on Saturday, citing official sources.
