Latest news with #Uncapped
CNBC
5 hours ago
- Business
- CNBC
Perplexity AI walked away from potential Meta deal before Zuckerberg's Scale AI stake
Meta approached artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI about a potential takeover bid before ultimately investing $14.3 billion into Scale AI, CNBC confirmed on Friday. The two companies did not finalize a deal, and Perplexity ultimately walked away from the discussions, according to a source familiar with the matter who asked not to be named because of the confidential nature of the negotiations. Bloomberg earlier reported the talks between Meta and Perplexity. Perplexity declined to comment. Meta did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment. Meta's attempt to purchase Perplexity serves as the latest example of Mark Zuckerberg's aggressive push to bolster his company's AI efforts amid fierce competition from OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet. Zuckerberg has grown agitated that rivals like OpenAI appear to be ahead in both underlying AI models and consumer-facing apps, and he is going to extreme lengths to hire top AI talent, as CNBC has previously reported. Meta now has a 49% stake in Scale after its multibillion-dollar investment, though the social media company will not have any voting power. Scale AI's founder Alexandr Wang, along with a small number of other Scale employees, will join Meta as part of the agreement. Earlier this year, Meta also tried to acquire Safe Superintelligence, which was reportedly valued at $32 billion in a fundraising round in April, as CNBC reported on Thursday. Daniel Gross, the CEO of Safe Superintelligence, and former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman are joining Meta's AI efforts, where they will work on products under Wang. Gross runs a venture capital firm with Friedman called NFDG, their combined initials, and Meta will get a stake in the firm. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on the latest episode of the "Uncapped" podcast, which is hosted by his brother, that Meta had tried to poach OpenAI employees by offering signing bonuses as high as $100 million with even larger annual compensation packages. "I've heard that Meta thinks of us as their biggest competitor," Altman said on the podcast. "Their current AI efforts have not worked as well as they have hoped and I respect being aggressive and continuing to try new things."
Time of India
7 hours ago
- Business
- Time of India
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says AI can now compete with people who have PhD
Sam Altman , CEO of OpenAI , has issued stark warnings about the rapid advancement of AI. He previously said that AI can perform tasks on par with, or even exceeding, the capabilities of entry-level employees but has now added that it can compete with those holding PhDs. This comes at a time when people are facing job cuts in the tech industry, prompting experts to weigh in on which jobs will endure and how new graduates can secure them. Altman's latest comments, made on the "Uncapped" podcast hosted by his brother Jack Altman last week, amplify his earlier statements about AI's growing prowess. "In some sense AIs are like a top competitive programmer in the world now or AIs can get a top score on the world's hardest math competitions or AIs can do problems that I'd expect an expert PhD in my field to do," the OpenAI CEO said. AI-led job cuts in tech industry Altman's comments came amidst a backdrop of growing concerns from other tech leaders. Companies like Amazon have indicated plans to reduce corporate roles due to AI integration. Recently, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy told the company employees to skill themselves in AI to be ahead of the curve. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Thị trường có dấu hiệu suy thoái không? IC Markets Đăng ký Undo Notably, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has cautioned that AI could eliminate half of all entry-level, white-collar positions. Meanwhile, Google and Microsoft CEOs have already said that a certain percentage of code written at the companies are now AI-generated. However, despite these challenges, experts suggest the job market is shifting. The tech executives have maintained that while AI will eat away some jobs, new kinds of work will be created that will push people to acquire special skills. World Music Day 2025: Tech That Changed How We Listen to Music AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
Economic Times
11 hours ago
- Business
- Economic Times
Mark Zuckerberg made abortive attempt to buy ex-OpenAI executive Ilya Sutskever's AI startup: Report
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's $14.2 billion investment in Scale AI last week, and roping in its CEO Alexandr Wang, appears to have been part of a larger game plan to build expertise in artificial intelligence (AI). Days after Sam Altman accused Zuckerberg of trying to poach OpenAI's talent, reports have emerged that Meta has been out shopping for other startups, including Ilya Sutskever's $32 billion Safe Superintelligence, launched just a year ago. Sources told news channel CNBC that Meta tried to acquire the startup founded by Sutskever, former chief scientist at OpenAI, earlier this year. However, Sutskever rebuffed the big tech giant's Zuckerberg started eyeing the chief executive of the startup, Daniel Gross. Zuckerberg is setting up a team of experts to achieve so-called "artificial general intelligence" (AGI), or machines that can match or surpass human capabilities. The Meta chief's apparent plans to personally recruit around 50 people, including a new head of AI research for the AGI team, is driven partly by frustration over the performance and reception of Meta's latest large language model, Llama 4. Altman swiped at Zuckerberg in his brother's podcast, 'Uncapped', saying that Meta tried to poach the company's AI talent for its superintelligence team. Additionally, he said Meta is not "great at innovation". The 'special thing' about OpenAI is that the company has built a culture that is good at 'repeatable' innovation, Altman noted.
Time of India
18 hours ago
- Business
- Time of India
Mark Zuckerberg made abortive attempt to buy ex-OpenAI executive Ilya Sutskever's AI startup: Report
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg 's $14.2 billion investment in Scale AI last week , and roping in its CEO Alexandr Wang, appears to have been part of a larger game plan to build expertise in artificial intelligence (AI). Days after Sam Altman accused Zuckerberg of trying to poach OpenAI 's talent, reports have emerged that Meta has been out shopping for other startups, including Ilya Sutskever 's $32 billion Safe Superintelligence , launched just a year ago. Sources told news channel CNBC that Meta tried to acquire the startup founded by Sutskever, former chief scientist at OpenAI, earlier this year. However, Sutskever rebuffed the big tech giant's efforts. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Play War Thunder now for free War Thunder Play Now Undo Subsequently, Zuckerberg started eyeing the chief executive of the startup, Daniel Gross. Zuckerberg is setting up a team of experts to achieve so-called "artificial general intelligence" (AGI), or machines that can match or surpass human capabilities. Live Events The Meta chief's apparent plans to personally recruit around 50 people, including a new head of AI research for the AGI team, is driven partly by frustration over the performance and reception of Meta's latest large language model, Llama 4. Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories Altman swiped at Zuckerberg in his brother's podcast, 'Uncapped', saying that Meta tried to poach the company's AI talent for its superintelligence team. Additionally, he said Meta is not "great at innovation" . The 'special thing' about OpenAI is that the company has built a culture that is good at 'repeatable' innovation, Altman noted.
CNBC
a day ago
- Business
- CNBC
Meta tried to buy Ilya Sutskever's $32 billion AI startup, but is now planning to hire its CEO
When Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg poached Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang last week as part of a $14.3 billion investment in the artificial intelligence startup, he was apparently just getting started. Zuckerberg's multibillion-dollar AI hiring spree has now turned to Daniel Gross, the CEO of Ilya Sutskever's startup Safe Superintelligence, and former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, according to sources with knowledge of the matter. It's not how Zuckerberg planned for a deal to go down. Earlier this year, sources said, Meta tried to acquire Safe Superintelligence, which was reportedly valued at $32 billion in a fundraising round in April. Sutskever, who just launched the startup a year ago, shortly after leaving OpenAI, rebuffed Meta's efforts, as well as the company's attempt to hire him, said the sources, who asked not to be named because the information is confidential. Soon after those talks ended, Zuckerberg started negotiating with Gross, the sources said. In addition to his role at Safe Superintelligence, Gross runs a venture capital firm with Friedman called NFDG, their combined initials. Both men are joining Meta as part of the transaction, and will work on products under Wang, one source said. Meta, meanwhile, will get a stake in NFDG, according to multiple sources. The Information was first to report on Meta's plans to hire Gross and Friedman. Gross, Friedman and Sutskever didn't respond to CNBC's requests for comment. A Meta spokesperson said the company "will share more about our superintelligence effort and the great people joining this team in the coming weeks." Zuckerberg's aggressive hiring tactics escalate an AI talent war that's reached new heights of late. Meta, Google and OpenAI, along with a host of other big companies and high-valued startups, are racing to develop the most powerful large language models, and pushing towards artificial general intelligence (AGI), or AI that's considered equal to or greater than human intelligence. Last week, Meta agreed to pump $14.3 billion into Scale AI to bring on Wang and a few other top engineers while getting a 49% stake in the startup. Altman said on the latest episode of the "Uncapped" podcast, which is hosted by his brother, that Meta has tried to lure OpenAI employees by offering signing bonuses as high as $100 million, with even larger annual compensation packages. Altman said "none of our best people have decided to take them up on that." "I've heard that Meta thinks of us as their biggest competitor," Atlman said on the podcast. "Their current AI efforts have not worked as well as they have hoped and I respect being aggressive and continuing to try new things." Meta didn't respond to a request for comment on Altman's remarks. OpenAI, for its part, has gone to similar lengths, paying about $6.5 billion to hire iPhone designer Jony Ive and to acquire his nascent devices startup io. Elsewhere, the founders of AI startup were recruited back to Google last year in a multibillion-dollar deal, while DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman was brought on by Microsoft in a $650 million purchase of talent from Inflection AI. In Gross, Zuckerberg is getting a longtime entrepreneur and AI investor. Gross founded the search engine Cue, which was acquired by Apple in 2013. He was a top executive at Apple and helped lead machine learning efforts and the development of Siri. He was later a partner at startup accelerator Y Combinator, before co‑founding Safe Superintelligence alongside Sutskever. Friedman co-founded two startups before becoming the CEO of GitHub following Microsoft's acquisition of the code-sharing platform in 2018. NFDG has backed Coinbase, Figma, CoreWeave, Perplexity and over the years, according to Pitchbook. It's unclear what happens to its investment portfolio in a Meta deal, a source said.
