Meta made insane offers in bid to nab OpenAI talent, Altman claims

OpenAI chief Sam Altman has said that Meta tried to tempt his top AI researchers to switch sides by offering hiring bonuses of $100 million. Yes, you read that right — $100 million. Altman said that up to now, none of his top team have left for Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta.

Altman made the claim on Tuesday in the Uncapped podcast, hosted by his brother, Jack.

“[Meta] started making these giant offers to a lot of people on our team,” the OpenAI boss said. “You know, like $100 million signing bonuses, more than that (in) compensation per year.”

He added: “I’m really happy that, at least so far, none of our best people have decided to take them up on that.”

The crazy offer is a mark of the intense competition that exists in the AI space, with Meta keen to avoid falling behind the likes of OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft when it comes to building out compelling AI products.

Indeed, the tech industry is witnessing an unprecedented battle for AI researchers, with compensation packages reaching levels previously unseen outside of elite finance or sports. 

The situation means that AI companies are also having to make some major offers to current employees in order to keep them on board. OpenAI has reportedly offered retention bonuses of several million dollars to persuade its top researchers to stay — on top of their reported $10 million annual pay — with Altman saying in Tuesday’s podcast that he thinks the financial rewards for his staff will grow over time. “I think it’s incentive aligned [at OpenAI], with mission first and economic rewards and everything else following from that,” he said.

In a Reuters report last month, leading OpenAI researcher Noam Brown said that when he was looking at job opportunities two years ago, he was courted by tech industry’s elite players. “Lunch with Google founder Sergey Brin, poker at Sam Altman’s, and a private jet visit from an eager investor,” the report said.

Brown said that even though it wasn’t the best offer financially, he ended up going with OpenAI as the company seemed intent on putting the right level of resources into its efforts.