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What’s on an AI researcher’s wish list when being courted by a Big Tech firm?
Sure, money plays a part. But Mark Zuckerberg says the AI talent he’s talked to is also interested in two other things.
“Historically, when I was recruiting people to different parts of the company, people are like, ‘Okay, what’s my scope going to be?'” he said on an episode of The Information’s TITV on Monday. “Here, people say, ‘I want the fewest number of people reporting to me and the most GPUs.'”
AI GPUs, or graphical processing units, are the chips that researchers use to build, train, and run foundational AI models and the products they power. Nvidia, whose H100 GPU became a hot commodity as the AI race kicked off, is viewed as the leader in the space and has since launched more powerful chips.
“Having basically the most compute per researcher is definitely a strategic advantage, not just for doing the work but for attracting the best people,” the Meta CEO said.
Others hiring in AI have attested to the same phenomenon.
Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas last year recalled trying to poach an AI researcher from Meta who shot him down, saying, “Come back to me when you have 10,000 H100 GPUs.”
“You have to offer such amazing incentives and immediate availability of compute,” Srinivas said. “And we’re not talking of small compute clusters here.”
Big Tech companies and artificial intelligence startups alike are clamoring for the best talent in AI right now, with some like Meta offering multimillion-dollar pay packages.
Meta has turbocharged its plans to build out its AI infrastructure. The company recently announced plans for new data centers, including one almost as big as Manhattan. Meta also shelled out $15 billion to buy a 49% stake in Scale AI, founded by Alexandr Wang, who joined as Meta’s chief AI officer as part of the deal.
Zuckerberg has also been personally involved in recruiting top AI talent.
And if a limited managerial scope and access to vast computing power aren’t enough to lure top talent, there’s always money — and Meta has plenty to offer its AI recruits.
The company has poached talent from rivals like Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman saying Meta is offering recruits $100 million signing bonuses.
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