Meta Cuts 600 Employees to Become ‘More Load-Bearing’ and Agile in Superintelligence Race

Meta is not done firing yet. While the year is nearing its end, the company continues to lay off more staff even as it hires aggressively for its new TBD Lab- its new research unit within Meta’s Superintelligence Labs that focuses on building next-generation AI models. In its latest round of job cuts, Meta is letting go of nearly 600 employees from its AI infrastructure teams, Fundamental Artificial Intelligence Research (FAIR) unit, and several product-related divisions.

According to media reports, Meta believes that its long-standing AI divisions had become too bureaucratic and a leaner structure will make decision-making faster and improve overall efficiency. “By reducing the size of our team, fewer conversations will be required to make a decision, and each person will be more load-bearing and have more scope and impact,” Meta’s chief AI officer Alexandr Wang wrote in a memo that was seen by several websites. 

The layoffs will affect parts of Meta’s AI research and infrastructure teams but will spare the newly formed TBD Lab, which remains central to the company’s superintelligence ambitions. 

Wang said Meta would try to place as many affected workers as possible into other roles within the company. “This is a talented group of individuals, and we need their skills in other parts of the company,” he added.

Even as it trims older teams, Meta is actively hiring for TBD Lab. The company recently brought in OpenAI research scientist Ananya Kumar and Andrew Tulloch, co-founder of Mira Murati’s Thinking Machines, as part of its ongoing push to strengthen its AI research capabilities.

The reorganisation follows growing concern from CEO Mark Zuckerberg that Meta’s previous AI efforts were not delivering the breakthroughs or performance improvements he expected. That frustration reportedly led to the creation of TBD Labs, a major reshuffle of teams, and a surge in hiring that coincided with Meta’s $15 billion investment in Scale AI and the appointment of Wang.

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