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Business Standard
4 days ago
- Business
- Business Standard
OpenAI offers millions in bonuses to 1,000 staff amid AI talent race
OpenAI is awarding substantial bonuses to approximately 1,000 employees, which makes up about one-third of its workforce, as part of its effort to retain top technical talent amid growing competitive pressure in the artificial intelligence sector, according to a report by The Information. The bonuses, which range from the low hundreds of thousands to several million dollars, are being offered to staff in technical research and engineering roles. Their value will be based on each employee's performance, seniority, and role. Employees will have the option to receive the payouts in either cash or equity, with the awards vesting quarterly over two years. OpenAI seeks $500 billion valuation The move comes as OpenAI rolls out GPT-5, its most advanced large language model to date, and prepares for a secondary share sale that would value the company at $500 billion —a significant increase from its previous $300 billion valuation. The transaction would allow current and former employees to sell shares, unlocking value amid OpenAI's rapid growth and strengthening retention. AI talent poaching and countermeasures In recent weeks, OpenAI has seen several researchers leave for Meta Platforms, which has launched a hiring spree to support its new 'superintelligence' division. In response, OpenAI Chief Research Officer Mark Chen circulated an internal memo promising aggressive countermeasures to address the talent drain. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has been outspoken about the competition. Speaking on Uncapped, a podcast hosted by his brother Jack Altman, he described Meta's tactics as 'crazy', citing signing bonus offers of up to $100 million—and in some cases, even more in total compensation. 'They started making giant offers to a lot of people on our team,' Altman said. 'So far, none of our best people have decided to take them up on that.' Meta's investment in AI and talent hunt Meta's push into advanced AI has been backed by a $14.3 billion investment in Scale AI, a key data-labelling company used to train large models. Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang has been tapped to lead Meta's AI initiative, which is reportedly overseen directly by CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Despite the rising competition, OpenAI's user growth remains strong. The company announced that ChatGPT now has 700 million weekly active users, up from 500 million in March, and processes more than three billion messages per day. The launch of GPT-5 is expected to further extend OpenAI's technological lead.
Time of India
11-07-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Money isn't everything: Meta's Superintelligence Labs roundly rejected by some despite tempting pay offers
Not every prospect Meta approached in its pursuit of 'superintelligence' gave in to the lure of a sizeable salary package, according to a report in The Mark Zuckerberg-led company recently began an intense effort to poach top artificial intelligence (AI) talent for its newly created Superintelligence Labs , as it seeks to take on rivals OpenAI, Google and Anthropic. As part of those efforts, it dangled handsome compensation packages to woo its recruitment company has been providing total annual remuneration ranging from $1 million to $1.4 million for AI positions, including the base salary, a yearly bonus, and amortised stock this promise of a lucrative salary apparently has a catch. One engineer, who rejected the offer, told the publication that Meta expected 'personal sacrifices' in exchange for such high salaries — sacrifices on the work-life balance front and on the principles individual employees adhere to when it comes to demands seem to be putting off many others from accepting Meta's offers. Both Anthropic and Google's DeepMind are said to have lost far fewer staff to Meta than other acquisition of Scale AI , which happened before the reveal, seemed innocent enough. Meta bought the company for $14.3 billion — in a so-called acquihire deal. As part of the deal, Meta hired the former Scale AI CEO, Alexandr Wang , to head the new division as chief AI then the hiring spree started, with OpenAI apparently the main per The Verge report, Meta has recruited up to 10 of OpenAI's leading researchers and model developers, with some compensation packages said to total as much as $300 million over four years, including equity. However, the report also mentioned that Meta disputes this said, OpenAI has not been Meta's only destination for talent acquisition. Several high-profile appointments have taken place, such as AI startup Safe Superintelligence's CEO Daniel Gross Ruoming Pang , head of Apple's Foundation Models team; and Nat Friedman, the former CEO of back-to-back hirings by Meta suggest that the company is now trying to catch up with competitors in the AI race, having fallen behind while it focused heavily on the metaverse. The Verge reports that the company's Llama AI models often perform poorly on publicly available performance about the poaching started when OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed in his brother Jack's Uncapped podcast that Meta has been offering his employees bonuses as high as $100 million to recruit now seems to be following in Meta's footsteps. The ChatGPT maker hired employees not just from Meta but also from Elon Musk's companies. It brought in David Lau, who was previously Tesla's vice president of software engineering, to join its scaling team. OpenAI has also added Uday Ruddarraju, former head of infrastructure engineering at xAI and X; Mike Dalton, an infrastructure engineer from xAI; and Angela Fan, an AI researcher from of this appears to be ultimately aimed at achieving artificial general intelligence — a system with human-level cognitive abilities, or even superintelligence, which would go beyond human the intensity of the competition, it may be only a matter of time before these ambitions become reality.
Business Insider
10-07-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
A Kleiner Perkins partner explains why the firm is betting on AI for highly paid jobs like doctors and lawyers
Kleiner Perkins invests in AI tools for high-paying jobs like doctors and lawyers. The firm targets digital assistants to simplify tasks in top professions. AI integration is becoming essential in workplaces, with leaders urging its adoption. In an episode of the "Uncapped" podcast published on Wednesday, a Kleiner Perkins partner, Mamoon Hamid, said the firm is investing in startups that make digital assistants for America's highest-paying jobs. "If you'd look at a chart of the top 20 jobs in the US by pay, those are doctors, lawyers, and engineers," Hamid said. "So we thought, OK, so how do we invest in copilots for these job types?" The VC added that: "There are parts of these jobs that are very nuanced and the human brain needs to process those parts of the job, but there's parts that AI is scribing or taking notes." Hamid said that the company had invested in Ambience, a startup for doctors, Harvey, a legal-tech platform for lawyers, and Windsurf, a coding assistance platform for engineers. He said that physical labor, which is often among the lowest-paying jobs, is harder to tackle with AI. "It's like back-breaking work that people do and still do it, and that's probably the hardest place to attack today," he said. "We're thinking sort of much further out, which is like robots, it's like humanoids." The Menlo Park-based firm specializes in investing in early-stage tech and life science startups. Founded in 1972, it has backed over 900 companies, including Amazon, Google, and Twitter. As AI improves, companies outside the tech industry are promoting or even mandating its use for their employees. That's leading to a rush of contracts for big companies, like OpenAI, and startups alike. In May, the CEO of Norway's $1.8 trillion sovereign wealth fund said that using AI is not "voluntary" for his employees. "If you don't use it, you will never be promoted. You won't get a job," Nicolai Tangen said. In a viral memo in April, Shopify's Tobias Ltke told employees that AI use is "now a fundamental expectation of everyone at Shopify" and "teams must demonstrate why they cannot get what they want done using AI" before asking for more head count. In the same month, Uber's CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, said not enough of his employees know how to use AI and that Uber is implementing training programs to change that. He added that learning to use AI agents to code is "going to be an absolute necessity at Uber within a year."
Business Insider
10-07-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
A Kleiner Perkins partner explains why the firm is betting on AI for highly paid jobs like doctors and lawyers
One venture capitalist is playing the AI game by investing in tools for top jobs. In an episode of the "Uncapped" podcast published on Wednesday, a Kleiner Perkins partner, Mamoon Hamid, said the firm is investing in startups that make digital assistants for America's highest-paying jobs. "If you'd look at a chart of the top 20 jobs in the US by pay, those are doctors, lawyers, and engineers," Hamid said. "So we thought, OK, so how do we invest in copilots for these job types?" The VC added that: "There are parts of these jobs that are very nuanced and the human brain needs to process those parts of the job, but there's parts that AI is scribing or taking notes." Hamid said that the company had invested in Ambience, a startup for doctors, Harvey, a legal-tech platform for lawyers, and Windsurf, a coding assistance platform for engineers. He said that physical labor, which is often among the lowest-paying jobs, is harder to tackle with AI. "It's like back-breaking work that people do and still do it, and that's probably the hardest place to attack today," he said. "We're thinking sort of much further out, which is like robots, it's like humanoids." The Menlo Park-based firm specializes in investing in early-stage tech and life science startups. Founded in 1972, it has backed over 900 companies, including Amazon, Google, and Twitter. As AI improves, companies outside the tech industry are promoting or even mandating its use for their employees. That's leading to a rush of contracts for big companies, like OpenAI, and startups alike. In May, the CEO of Norway's $1.8 trillion sovereign wealth fund said that using AI is not "voluntary" for his employees. "If you don't use it, you will never be promoted. You won't get a job," Nicolai Tangen said. In a viral memo in April, Shopify's Tobias Lütke told employees that AI use is "now a fundamental expectation of everyone at Shopify" and "teams must demonstrate why they cannot get what they want done using AI" before asking for more head count. In the same month, Uber's CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, said not enough of his employees know how to use AI and that Uber is implementing training programs to change that. He added that learning to use AI agents to code is "going to be an absolute necessity at Uber within a year."
Indian Express
07-07-2025
- Automotive
- Indian Express
ChatGPT-like breakthrough in humanoid robotics expected in 2-3 years, says Vinod Khosla
From industrial automation to autonomous electric vehicles (EVs) and delivery drones, artificial intelligence has already been shaping the physical world which has led to the emergence of a separate branch known as embodied or physical AI. While generative AI models are all the rage these days, they could also potentially drive breakthroughs in physical AI. It could usher in a new era of multi-tasking, humanoid robots which may be here sooner than you think, according to billionaire venture capitalist (VC) Vinod Khosla. 'Robotics will take a little longer, but I think we'll have the ChatGPT moment in the next two to three years,' Khosla said in an appearance on a podcast titled 'Uncapped' on YouTube last week. The 70-year-old VC's prediction that fully autonomous robots will be here in the next few years is noteworthy given that he has a strong track record of spotting what's next. For instance, Khosla was an early stage investor in OpenAI. DoorDash, Block, and Impossible Foods are some of the other notable companies in his investment portfolio. 'Almost everybody in the 2030s will have a humanoid robot at home. Probably start with something narrow like do your cooking for you. It can chop vegetables, cook food, clean dishes, but stays within the kitchen environment,' Khosla said. He also said that they will be available at lower costs due to high demand. These robots could cost between $300 to $400 a month, Khosla estimated. On the progress of Chinese companies in building humanoid robots, Khosla called it 'pretty damn amazing.' However, he said that these robots currently had a major drawback. 'They're not learning robots. You change the environment and they don't do as well. If you walk a human in here and say clean up, they'll know what to do. A robot needs to do that,' he said. When asked why big tech companies like Apple are not focused on building humanoid robots, Khosla suggested that breakthroughs in physical AI would come from smaller players as opposed to large incumbents. Uber, for example, did not come from Hertz, nor was Netflix a product of major networks, he said. Khosla's remarks are in line with those of several tech leaders who are betting big on robotics and physical AI. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has repeatedly said that robots will play a significant role in both industries and daily life in the future. 'I love the idea that I'll have my own R2-D2, my own C-3PO — my R2 will be following me, and for many people just growing up now, they'll have their own personal R2 with them for their lives,' Huang said at an event last year. While speaking at the chipmaker's annual investor meeting last week, Huang further said that AI and robotics represent 'a multitrillion-dollar growth opportunity' for Nvidia, which is shifting focus toward autonomous vehicles and other commercial applications of robotics. Besides Nvidia, Amazon also considers robotics to be a growth area with CEO Andy Jassy recently saying, 'We're going to hire more people in AI and more people in robotics.' In an interview with Bloomberg last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman not only predicted breakthroughs in robotics but also warned about their impact on jobs. 'I don't think the world has really had the humanoid robots moment yet, and I don't think that's very far away […] What happens when the humanoid robots get here? I mean, obviously do a lot of jobs,' he said.
