Latest news with #ThinkingMachinesLab
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
AI Researcher Declines $1 Billion Offer From Mark Zuckerberg
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is absolutely tripping over himself to attract top AI talent to fill the ranks of his recently announced Superintelligence Labs — and he's willing to go to obscene lengths to make it happen. As Wired reports, more than a dozen people at Thinking Machines Lab, an AI startup founded by former OpenAI executive Mira Murati, were approached by Meta with ludicrous job offers. One individual was even offered more than $1 billion, paid out over several years, a source told Wired — a staggering amount of money, needless to say. But despite the mind-shattering amount of money on the table, not a single person at TML has taken the offer, hinting at some glaring brand issues Zuckerberg could be dealing with. Ouch! Meta communications director Andy Stone disputed the exact figures to Wired, but confirmed offers were made. The reporting suggests we've truly hit peak AI hype, as hundreds of billions of dollars are being poured into the tech despite little in the way of ROI in sight. The news comes as an increasingly desperate Zuckerberg has been offering enormous sign-on bonuses to flesh out his Superintelligence Labs, as part of a broader bid to stay relevant in the ongoing race currently being led by Meta's competitors, including OpenAI and Google. Earlier this year, Zuckerberg poached Ruoming Pang, the former head of Apple's fumbling "Apple Intelligence" software, as well as 28-year-old Scale AI cofounder Alexandr Wang, to lead the lab. "We've been following your work on advancing technology and the benefits of AI for everyone over the years," reads a message Zuckerberg previously sent to a potential recruit, as quoted by Wired. "We're making some important investments across research, products and our infrastructure in order to build the most valuable AI products and services for people." Meta has struggled to keep up with the competition, stumbling with the rollout of its latest Llama 4 large language model. Earlier this year, the company became embroiled in controversy after being accused of fudging the AI model's benchmark results. That general aura could have to do with why the TML staffers didn't take Meta up on its more-than-generous offers. For one, sources told Wired that they're not excited about Wang's leadership style, raising concerns over his "relative lack of experience." The Murati-led startup also raised the largest funding round in history, ballooning to a valuation of $12 billion in just a single year. In other words, they have plenty of money to throw at talent retention. As the AI hype continues to balloon to epic proportions, Zuckerberg is spending billions of dollars on AI talent to realize his hazy goal of creating what he calls "personal superintelligence." It's an enormous bet, as investors and economists are becoming increasingly wary of a dot-com-style bubble in the AI space, where the tech is exciting-yet-imperfect, and a sustainable business model remains elusive. If anything, the latest news suggests AI researchers are in the driver's seat — and Zuckerberg's Meta is clearly not making the list as they continue to collect cushy job offers that could make them wildly wealthy overnight. More on Meta: Mark Zuckerberg Looks Like He's Been Taken Hostage as He Explains Plan for Deploying AI Superintelligence Errore nel recupero dei dati Effettua l'accesso per consultare il tuo portafoglio Errore nel recupero dei dati Errore nel recupero dei dati Errore nel recupero dei dati Errore nel recupero dei dati
News.com.au
3 days ago
- Business
- News.com.au
The former Perth student who knocked back Mark Zuckerberg
EXCLUSIVE A former elite Perth schoolboy who reportedly turned down a billion-dollar offer from Mark Zuckerberg has been described as a 'modest' man. has discovered the impressive family stock of leading AI mind Andrew Tulloch, who made global headlines for rejecting a reported $1.5 billion payday to work for Meta. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, responded to say the description of the offer first reported by the Wall Street Journal 'is inaccurate and ridiculous'. It can be revealed Mr Tulloch, a University of Sydney graduate now in his mid 30s labelled an 'extreme genius' by an ex-colleague, is the grandson of former New Zealand prime minister Sir John Marshall. His father, retired doctor Alastair Tulloch, was in 2020 made a member of the Order of Australia for significant service to medicine, urology, and the community of Claremont, WA. The former long-term Town of Claremont councillor Dr Tulloch AM declined to comment on his son's career when contacted by saying Andrew was a 'modest' man. Now based in California, Andrew Tulloch this year co-founded the AI start-up Thinking Machines Lab a venture that already has a reported value of $18.5 billion. Another of the five co-founders is Mira Murati, whom Mr Tulloch previously worked with at OpenAI – the company behind ChatGPT. Before that the Australian spent 11 years at Facebook's AI research arm. Ms Murati wrote on X last month that Thinking Machines Lab aimed 'to empower humanity through advancing collaborative general intelligence'. 'We're building multimodal AI that works with how you naturally interact with the world – through conversation, through sight, through the messy way we collaborate.' Mr Tulloch's work at OpenAI included pre-training for ChatPGT4o and 4.5, and reasoning for the o series, his LinkedIn profile states. Responding to the Journal's article on July 31, Meta communication director Andy Stone wrote on X the company 'made offers only to a handful of people at TML and while there was one sizeable offer, the details are off'. 'At the end of the day, this all begs the question who is spinning this narrative and why.' At Facebook, according to a CV seen by Mr Tulloch built machine learning platforms 'capable of learning multi-billion dimensional weight vectors trained from tens of billions of impressions per day in real time, distributed across hundreds of servers, and predicting millions of examples every second'. Mr Tulloch graduated from prestigious Christ Church Grammar School in 2007 with a TER of 99.95 and placed second out of 10,000 West Australian students in the final school exams. He was the school Dux and served as a prefect, as the captain of mock trials and debating and represented Australia in the international Chemistry Olympiad competition. The Year 12 student was awarded a silver medal at the chemistry competition held in Moscow, ranking 42nd overall and first in the southern hemisphere. A 2014 article posted to the school website recounts former Australian prime minister John Howard attending an event to promote his book on Sir Robert Menzies. The event was co-presented by the Centre for Ethics, whose director Canon Frank Sheehan was quoted speaking about a white hat he was seen wearing. 'Interestingly, the hat belongs to former Christ Church parent Margaret Tulloch, whose husband Alistair (sic) is pictured alongside me,' he said. 'Sir Menzies presented this hat to his friend Sir John Marshall, the Prime Minister of New Zealand. Sir John was Margaret's father.' The article noted Alastair and Margaret Tulloch were the parents of 2007 graduate Andrew Tulloch. In a statement, the Chirst Church Grammar School Old Boys' Association said it did not wish to make a comment about the success of its alumnus. 'The Old Boys' Association takes great pride in recognising and celebrating the achievements of members within our community, many of whom continue to make significant contributions across a wide range of fields,' it said. 'While we acknowledge the interest surrounding this matter, the Old Boys' Association will not be making any comment at this time.' During his uni days he graduated with first class honours and the university medal in mathematics at Sydney uni in 2011, with the highest GPA in the Faculty of Science. Afterwards he completed a masters in mathematical statistics and machine learning at the University of Cambridge in 2013 and 2014. Mr Tulloch also worked part-time as an analyst at Goldman Sachs while studying in Sydney, developing 'machine learning models to improve trading algorithms for the optimal execution of market orders'. Meta has pumped billions into its AI teams and has reportedly been attempting to poach leading minds from rivals as it seeks to establish itself as the frontrunner in the game-changing technology. OpenAI chief Sam Altman said in June that Meta had offered US$100 million bonuses ($155 million) to his employees in a bid to win over talent for its generative AI teams. Mr Altman also said Mr Zuckerberg's company offered 'giant' annual salaries exceeding US$100 million to OpenAI staffers. 'I'm really happy that at least so far none of our best people have decided to take them up on that,' he said. Meta did secure the services of OpenAI researcher Yuanzhi Li in July, after appointing Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang as its head of 'superintelligence'. Mr Zuckerberg last month said in a staff memo that the rest of the 2020s would be a key period in 'determining the path this technology will take'. 'Over the last few months we have begun to see glimpses of our AI systems improving themselves,' he wrote. 'The improvement is slow for now, but undeniable. Developing superintelligence is now in sight.'
NDTV
4 days ago
- Business
- NDTV
What Meta Did After Mira Murati Rejected Mark Zuckerberg's Offer To Buy Her Startup
Mark Zuckerberg launched a full-scale recruitment raid on Thinking Machines Lab after founder Mira Murati rejected his offer to acquire the 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.
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Business Standard
5 days ago
- Business
- Business Standard
After Mira Murati's rejection, her cofounder turns down Zuckerberg's $1.5 bn offer
In a high-stakes bid to dominate the artificial intelligence race, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg made an audacious move to acquire Thinking Machines Lab, the AI startup founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati. Despite a reported $1 billion offer, Murati turned down the deal, triggering an aggressive recruitment campaign by Zuckerberg to lure away her top talent. As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Zuckerberg did not take Murati's refusal lightly. He is said to have personally launched a 'full-scale raid' on the startup, approaching over a dozen of its 50 employees to convince them to switch sides. At the centre of this poaching attempt was Andrew Tulloch, co-founder of San Francisco-based Thinking Machines Lab and a celebrated figure in AI circles. In what has been described as an 'intense' recruitment effort, Zuckerberg offered Tulloch a staggering compensation package reportedly worth $1.5 billion over six years — contingent on bonuses and stock performance. AI veteran turns Meta down Tulloch, however, declined the offer. A machine learning expert, Tulloch previously worked at Meta from 2012 to 2023 and played a key role in building PyTorch, a widely used AI research framework. He also spent a year at OpenAI working on GPT-4's training and reasoning models before co-founding Thinking Machines Lab with Murati in early 2025, The Wall Street Journal mentioned. Meta denies acquisition attempt Responding to the report, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone dismissed the $1.5 billion compensation figure as 'inaccurate and ridiculous', adding that such packages depend heavily on Meta's stock price. Stone also denied that Meta ever tried to acquire Thinking Machines Lab. Who is Andrew Tulloch? Andrew Tulloch graduated with first-class honours and a University Medal in mathematics from the University of Sydney, followed by a Master's in Mathematical Statistics at Cambridge. He is currently pursuing a PhD at UC Berkeley. During his previous stint at Meta, Tulloch's work left such a mark that even Alexandr Wang — now head of Meta's Superintelligence Lab — personally tried to woo him back. Back in 2016, OpenAI's Greg Brockman also tried to hire Tulloch but could not match his then-Facebook salary. Tulloch finally joined OpenAI in 2023 after ChatGPT went mainstream. Meta's hiring spree targets rivals Tulloch wasn't the only one on Meta's radar. The company has aggressively pursued top AI minds, especially from OpenAI and startups formed by its alumni—like Dario Amodei's Anthropic and Murati's Thinking Machines. Meta reportedly approached more than 100 OpenAI employees and managed to hire at least 10. Among those who joined Meta was 24-year-old Matt Deitke. Initially declining an offer of $125 million, Deitke reportedly changed his mind after Zuckerberg personally offered to double it — raising the package to $250 million, with $100 million guaranteed in the first year alone.
India Today
5 days ago
- Business
- India Today
Mira Murati said no to Mark Zuckerberg proposal, so he launched $1.5 billion war to hire her top engineer
You should never bet against Mark Zuckerberg, or so runs a popular saying in Silicon Valley. That is because Zuckerberg is considered ruthlessly determined, and he almost always has way. But recently he was thwarted and now he is reportedly angry. Recently Zucekrberg made a proposal to former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, seeking to purchase her AI company Thinking Machines Lab. But when Mira said no, Zuckerberg decided to poach her top engineer. Money on offer — $1.5 to a WSJ report, the Meta CEO reportedly launched the "full-scale raid" on a potentially rival AI startup after its founder, and former OpenAI CTO, Mira Murati refused a $1 billion acquisition offer. The recruitment drive, which can only be classified as 'intense', targeted more than a dozen employees at Murati's startup called Thinking Machines Lab, culminating in a staggering offer to one of its most prolific engineers, Andrew Wall Street Journal reports that Tulloch, who is a renowned machine learning expert and cofounder of Thinking Machines Lab, was offered a salary cumulatively amounting to a whopping $1.5 billion over six years by Meta. In an unexpected turn of events, however, he chose to decline the said offer. It has been known for a while now that Zuckerberg has taken upon himself to hire top AI talent from across the industry for his Superintelligence dream team, personally reaching out to researchers and engineers such as Tulloch, luring them with hefty pay cheques and eye-watering bonuses. Tulloch's reputation precedes him. He is known for his work in building machine learning systems and for his key role in developing PyTorch, a widely used AI research tool, during his stint at Meta — yes, he previously worked at Meta. His work was so good, even Alexandr Wang, who now leads Meta's Superintelligence Lab, tried to persuade him to return. It would have been a homecoming of sorts. Only Tulloch was in no mood to return, having clearly found his calling elsewhere. And if Twitter chatter is to be believed, he probably also declined the meta offer because he could be holding a significant equity in Thinking Machines Labs, which has already been valued north of $30 billion.A graduate of the University of Sydney with first-class honors and a University Medal in mathematics, Tulloch holds a Master's from Cambridge and is a Ph.D. candidate at UC Berkeley. He worked at Meta from 2012 to 2023, and a year at OpenAI, where he contributed to the pre-training and reasoning models of GPT-4. He cofounded Thinking Machines Lab with Mira Murati in early aggressive recruitment drive is not limited to Thinking Machines Lab. The company has been actively trying to poach employees from OpenAI and other AI startups, including Dario Amodei's Anthropic. advertisementThe WSJ report notes that Meta has reached out to more than 100 OpenAI employees and successfully hired at least 10 of them. In a statement, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone called the reported compensation offer to Tulloch "inaccurate and ridiculous," while adding that such packages are dependent on stock performance. (Stone also mentioned that Meta never tried to acquire Thinking Machines.)But while Tulloch refused to take the bait, others like 24-year-old Matt Deitke gave in after Zuckerberg's persistence. According to The New York Times, Deitke initially declined to join Meta at a compensation of $125 million. Zuckerberg apparently sought him out in person, promised to double the package to an astounding $250 million with $100 million guaranteed to be paid upfront within the first year, convincing Dietke to jump ship and get aboard Meta's latest AI blitzkrieg.- EndsTrending Reel
