Meta has reportedly hired Ruoming Pang, Apple’s top executive in charge of its AI foundation models.
Meta has reportedly offered Pang a package worth tens of millions of dollars annually to lure him away.
With Pang’s exit, Zhifeng Chen will lead the AFM team under a new management structure.
In a major shake-up in the tech industry’s AI talent race, Meta has reportedly hired Ruoming Pang, Apple’s top executive in charge of its AI foundation models. Pang’s exit marks a significant setback for Apple’s AI ambitions, especially as the company pushes to keep pace with rivals like OpenAI, Google and Meta. According to Bloomberg, Meta has offered Pang a package worth tens of millions of dollars annually to lure him away.
SurveyAt Apple, Pang led a team of around 100 people focused on developing the company’s large language models, which power Apple Intelligence and various AI features. His team also worked on the AI models meant to power the new version of Siri.
Pang will be joining several other big names at Meta, including Alexandr Wang from Scale AI, former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, and OpenAI and Anthropic researchers. His departure may signal the beginning of a wave of exits from the AFM group, as several engineers have reportedly informed colleagues of their plans to leave soon.
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This high-profile exit, the most notable within Apple’s AI team since work began on Apple Intelligence a few years ago, highlights the battle for top talent in the rapidly growing AI sector. Meta has been aggressively hiring leading engineers with offers reportedly worth several million dollars annually, far surpassing the compensation Apple provides for similar roles.
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With Pang’s exit, Zhifeng Chen will lead the AFM team under a new management structure, according to the report. Apple’s broader AI strategy is now largely overseen by Craig Federighi, the company’s software engineering chief, and Mike Rockwell, who helped create the Apple Vision Pro headset and currently heads engineering for Siri.
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Ayushi Jain
Tech news writer by day, BGMI player by night. Combining my passion for tech and gaming to bring you the latest in both worlds. View Full Profile
