Latest news with #AndrewBosworth
Times
07-07-2025
- Business
- Times
A few human brains are the real smart ones in the AI arms race
D on't be fooled by the talk of artificial intelligence outsmarting humans. AI is all about real-life people and we are in the middle of a full-blown war for their brains. In the largest-ever poaching effort in corporate history, stories are circulating that Mark Zuckerberg is dishing out football-style signing-on bonuses of up to $100 million a head to lure the sharpest AI minds to Meta Platforms. Wired magazine reported that $300 million over four years was on offer. 'The market's hot; it's not that hot,' is how Andrew Bosworth, chief technology officer at Meta, dismissed it. Instead, he insisted, there are a 'small number of leadership roles' that command a premium and might make a $100 million package. Semantics, some might say, but if the exact number of zeroes on offer is unclear, the skyward trend is not.
South China Morning Post
02-07-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
Why Silicon Valley signing up to nationalism puts Asia on edge
A day before the controversial military parade in Washington celebrating the US Army's 250th anniversary (which, coincidentally, fell on President Donald Trump's 79th birthday), a more discreet yet significant event took place. On June 13, the US Army swore four C-suite technologists into its reserve ranks with the launch of Detachment 201, its executive innovation corps. The newly commissioned lieutenant colonels are Shyam Sankar , Palantir Technologies' chief technology officer; Andrew Bosworth, Meta's chief technology officer; Kevin Weil, OpenAI's chief product officer; and Bob McGrew, Thinking Machines Lab's adviser and formerly OpenAI's chief research officer. Dressed in military fatigues at their oath-taking ceremony, the reserve officers symbolised a fusion of two of the greatest US exports: capitalism and lethality. This merger of the boardroom and the battlefield is not new. In the early 1960s, Dwight Eisenhower cautioned against the rise of the US military-industrial complex even as he recognised the 'imperative need' for it. Since then, US tech dominance – led by the private sector and supported by the government – has only accelerated the inevitability of the military-technology complex in the digital age. But Silicon Valley's attitude towards Washington was not always this eager. The image of libertarian tech elites in the West Coast in the early days of start-ups, along with their ideals of individual autonomy and limited government, is a far cry from the assertive nationalism of US Big Tech now. Alex Karp , CEO of Palantir, a major US defence and security contractor that specialises in commercial data analytics software, has unapologetically championed Western dominance through a combination of hard power and technology. Contemptuous of protests by tech workers against engineering technology for US weapons development, Karp has instead embraced the idea of scaring America's enemies and killing them, if necessary.
Business Insider
01-07-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
Tech execs from companies chasing defense contracts are now Army officers. A watchdog is calling for an investigation.
A watchdog group has called on the Defense Department's Inspector General office to probe whether the recent commissioning of four tech executives as part-time Army officers is in keeping with laws and practices against self-dealing. The Democracy Defenders Fund sent the letter on Tuesday, requesting that investigators determine "whether the assignment of these officials to the Army Reserve is consistent with the Federal conflict of interest laws" and whether their appointments qualify as "misuse of position and nonpublic information." The executives — Shyam Sankar, chief technology officer of Palantir; Andrew Bosworth, chief technology officer of Meta; Kevin Weil, chief product officer at OpenAI; and Bob McGrew, an advisor at Thinking Machines Lab who was the chief research officer for OpenAI — joined the Army Reserve just weeks ago. The men will forego traditional three-month boot camp for a two-week crash course on Army history and basic military knowledge. These executives may be in a position to influence Army and Defense Department contracts as newly minted lieutenant colonels or share vital inside information to benefit their companies, which could increase the value of compensation like stock options. It is not unusual for civilians with expertise to bypass the most junior officer ranks for mid-level appointments. Historically that has most often included chaplains, veterinarians, and medical providers, career fields that require advanced degrees to join. The Army has made efforts to recruit more Americans with cyber and tech experience, though the four executives are the highest-profile enlistments to date. The Democracy Defenders Fund outlined special concerns regarding ongoing contract work Palantir and OpenAI have undertaken with the DoD recently. It's common for military reservists to have civilian careers in the DoD. The problem with these tech execs, the group says, are the profound amounts of lucrative government contracts at stake for their companies. "Some of these individuals have significant personal financial stakes in their outside employers, including stock, stock options, restricted stock units, and performance-based bonuses, which they seem unlikely to divest for a part-time government position," the letter read. "Given the ongoing and clear financial interest these appointees have in the adoption of Artificial Intelligence by the Department of Defense, there is a real risk that these individuals may engage in self-dealing or use their positions or nonpublic government information to benefit their outside employers in violation of federal law," it continued. The executives' commissions are part of a larger Army effort to rapidly modernize to better harness Silicon Valley's tech for future battlefields. Some experts have previously noted that the expertise such executives have is likely to be an imperative for future peer-level conflicts. Business Insider asked Army officials if concerns regarding executives' potential conflicts of interest have already been addressed, but did not receive a response before Tuesday afternoon. Officials have previously said the executives will be held to the same ethical standard as other service members. "Palantir, Meta, OpenAI, and Thinking Machines each have a significant financial interest in DoD adopting AI," the letter read, adding that the DoD has already awarded over $1 billion worth of contracts to Palantir and its subsidiaries while OpenAI has a $200 million AI contract with the military.
Yahoo
28-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Meta reportedly hires four more researchers from OpenAI
Looks like Meta isn't done poaching talent from OpenAI. Earlier this week, TechCrunch reported that Meta had hired influential OpenAI researcher Trapit Bansal, and according to The Wall Street Journal, it also hired three other researchers from the company. Now The Information is reporting four more Meta hires from OpenAI: Researchers Shengjia Zhao, Jiahui Yu, Shuchao Bi, and Hongyu Ren. This hiring spree comes after the April launch of Meta's Llama 4 AI models, which reportedly did not perform as well as CEO Mark Zuckerberg had hoped. (The company was also criticized over the version of Llama that it used for a popular benchmark.) There's been some back-and-forth between the two companies, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman suggesting that Meta was offering '$100 million signing bonuses' while adding that 'so far, none of our best people' have left. Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth then told employees that while senior leaders may have been offered that kind of money, 'the actual terms of the offer' were more complex than a simple one-time signing bonus.
TechCrunch
28-06-2025
- Business
- TechCrunch
Meta reportedly hires four more researchers from OpenAI
In Brief Looks like Meta isn't done poaching talent from OpenAI. Earlier this week, TechCrunch reported that Meta had hired influential OpenAI researcher Trapit Bansal, and according to The Wall Street Journal, it also hired three other researchers from the company. Now The Information is reporting four more Meta hires from OpenAI: Researchers Shengjia Zhao, Jiahui Yu, Shuchao Bi, and Hongyu Ren. This hiring spree comes after the April launch of Meta's Llama 4 AI models, which reportedly did not perform as well as CEO Mark Zuckerberg had hoped. (The company was also criticized over the version of Llama that it used for a popular benchmark.) There's been some back-and-forth between the two companies, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman suggesting that Meta was offering '$100 million signing bonuses' while adding that 'so far, none of our best people' have left. Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth then told employees that while senior leaders may have been offered that kind of money, 'the actual terms of the offer' were more complex than a simple one-time signing bonus.
