Altman Says Meta Targeting OpenAI Staff With $100 Million Bonuses as AI Race Intensifies 32
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman accused Meta of attempting to poach his developers with $100 million sign-on bonuses and higher compensation packages as the social media giant races to catch up in AI race. Altman said Meta, which has a $1.8 trillion market capitalization, began making the offers to his team members after falling behind in AI efforts. "I've heard that Meta thinks of us as their biggest competitor," Altman said on the Uncapped podcast [video] hosted by his brother.
None of his "best people" had accepted Zuckerberg's offers, he said. Meta has been recruiting top researchers and engineers from rival companies to build a new "superintelligence" team focused on developing AGI. The Facebook parent company has struggled this year to match competitors, facing criticism over its Llama 4 language model and delaying its flagship "Behemoth" AI model.
None of his "best people" had accepted Zuckerberg's offers, he said. Meta has been recruiting top researchers and engineers from rival companies to build a new "superintelligence" team focused on developing AGI. The Facebook parent company has struggled this year to match competitors, facing criticism over its Llama 4 language model and delaying its flagship "Behemoth" AI model.
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Yeah, if Meta was offering $100M signing bonuses, it wouldn't be an "attempt" to poach, it would be a very successful poaching.
Re: $100 million? (Score:2)
Is this about hiring talent or trying to dethrone OpenAI? I think I know something about AI and I'd like a new job, I mean $100 million, lol.
Moneygrubbing Sam being out-moneygrubbed (Score:3)
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The violin is NOT tiny! (Score:3)
Also, it is not the rat that's playing it!
AI can't even get that one right.
Is this yet another one of OpenAI's creations?
Re:The violin is NOT tiny! (Score:4, Funny)
That's enough slashvertisements for one day /s (Score:2)
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You must be new...
Fee market for labour (Score:1)
Employees are free to offer their services to the highest bidder.
Employers are free to offer employees as much as they like.
Fuck Altman and anyone else who wants to restrict the ability of people to freely move within the labour market.
Re:Fee market for labour (Score:4, Insightful)
Altman's not doing that though. He's playing his rubes. Altman is going full Trump, triggering outrage.
No one is declining a 100M signing bonus unless they have a similar compensation package already, and no one is offering signing bonuses like that unless they are required to recruit. Is that the case here? The purpose of this claim is not to reveal truth, it's to enrage stupid people. Sam Altman is a billionaire playing the victim, just like he is when he threatens Microsoft with antitrust immediately after playing them for his benefit..
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I'm curious if these compensation packages are mostly stock and/or options?
any idea on that?
If the rewards are mostly in the future that incentivizes people to not jump ship, and costs very little in the present.
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Isn't it interesting that these guys are all about at-will employment, until a better employment offer comes along. Then it's "poaching."
Fuck them. If someone is so important to your enterprise that you can't handle them going away in two weeks, sign a fucking contract.
Too much cash, too little to show. (Score:3)
Throwing nine figures at individuals because you can’t compete on output isn’t strategy, it’s panic.
If Meta needs $100M per hire to stay in the game, maybe it’s not the right game.
Or maybe it’s time to return some capital to shareholders.
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they can hire me for $100mil, i won't complain.
Retirement (Score:3)
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That is find with Meta. They are not after building the best, they are after having the best offering. They already have the minimum saleable product. As far as Zuck is concerned staying a head of the competition is all the matters. That can be achieved by development in house, acquisition, or simply kneecapping the competitors; or any combination of the three. The precise mix is not important to him.
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Incorrect, the employment contract specifies that your brain is donated to your employer should you leave.
Re:Retirement (Score:5, Insightful)
The $100M bonus, if not an exaggeration, is probably restricted stock/options which will require you to be there four years to get all the money.
The $100M number seems too high to be realistic to me. For reference, Tim Cook's total compensation last year was $60M. Since his compensation is probably heavily tilted toward equity, we can assume that what he was actually paid in grants (the value of the stock/options when they were given, but not yet vested) was probably more like $15-30M. If Altman had said $1M, I would have easily believed him. Had he said, $10M I would've had doubts. But he said $100M and that's clearly absurd.
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The $100M bonus, if not an exaggeration, is probably restricted stock/options which will require you to be there four years to get all the money.
The $100M number seems too high to be realistic to me. For reference, Tim Cook's total compensation last year was $60M. Since his compensation is probably heavily tilted toward equity, we can assume that what he was actually paid in grants (the value of the stock/options when they were given, but not yet vested) was probably more like $15-30M. If Altman had said $1M, I would have easily believed him. Had he said, $10M I would've had doubts. But he said $100M and that's clearly absurd.
I wonder if it's the case that the people being targeted having $100m+ in OpenAI stock options, and those options go away if they jump ship to Meta. That would explain why they might be sticking with OpenAI because they believe it can succeed.
Meta pulled in $160B last year, so a couple billion trying to buy the industry's top AI team isn't a terrible idea, though I'm not sure it will succeed. I think OpenAI has the lead, but the quality of LLMs are starting to converge and OpenAI's lead at this point is mos
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That still plays into their game. This isn't about some deep and insightful knowledge that is only in your head. This is about taking you off the board so your competition can't employ that person. And once you've signed the NDA, Meta has gotten what it wanted.
Just be really careful about the hiring agreement language - if there's a "vesting period" on that signing bonus but no such period on the NDA, it's very possible that they hire you, and then shitcan you right before the $100M vest and you're still
\o/ (Score:1)
In reality he competes with every business and freelancer in the world - is there a possible future where the people of the world can continue to feed their families AND OpenAI etc continue to satisfy the demands of their shareholders? Time will tell.
Sounds like deep delusion (Score:2)
Or direct lying. The whole AI mess is, if anything, slowing down as the actual very limited usefullness becomes slowly more obvious.
Like Pro Athletes (Score:2)
How is this any different that elite players in Professional Sports? Pick your big-money sport. Baseball, Soccer/Football, American Football, Basketball. It's just a different industry...same incentive.
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In professional sports, most of the players have contract employment.
I.e. they are better protected against bad-faith actions from the employer. You don't get any of that with OpenAI or Meta as they will give you "employment at-will" and fire you before the $100M they dangle in front of you vests.
isn't that market forces (Score:2)
I'll do it for $50M (Score:2)
Pay me $50M and I'll work using REAL intelligence. I'll even wear one of those fake robot suit that Tesla uses to pretend it has robots that can do things.
Already been tried... (Score:2)
"Fake it till you unicorn? Builder.aiâ(TM)s Natasha was never AI â" just 700 Indian coders behind the curtain"
https://techfundingnews.com/fa... [techfundingnews.com]