Meta Hires Salesforce AI Chief Clara Shih to Lead New Business AI Group

Meta hires Salesforce's CEO of AI, Clara Shih, to lead new business AI group | TechCrunch

Meta hired Salesforce's CEO of AI, Clara Shih, to lead a new organization building AI tools for businesses that use Meta's apps to reach consumers, according to a LinkedIn post from Shih on Tuesday. Meta confirmed the appointment and the new Business AI group in a statement to TechCrunch. "I'm thrilled to share today that I've joined Meta to lead a new Business AI group," said Shih in a LinkedIn post. "Our vision for this new product group is to make cutting-edge AI accessible to every business, empowering all to find success and own their future in the AI era." Meta has a unusual business model around AI, claiming to use an open-source approach, though not by everyone's definition of it. Mark Zuckerberg's company doesn't sell a subscription to its AI chatbots, like OpenAI or Google, in order to generate revenue. Instead, Meta is betting that its Llama large-language models will make its current family of apps that much better. These AI tools for businesses seem to be part of that effort. Specifically, Meta's new group will offer AI products made with Llama to the millions of businesses advertising and creating content on Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp. It's unclear exactly what kind of tools Meta could offer these folks, but offering tools to create AI-generated ads seems likely. Meta has recently pushed more AI-generated content into its social media feeds, including a carousel on Facebook of AI-generated photos, and AI chatbots imitating content creators on Instagram. That's a notable shift for Meta's platforms, which previously only featured human-generaged content. Giving businesses tools to cheaply generate more ads could be quite lucrative for Meta. It's unclear if Meta will sell these AI tools, or if they'll be offered for free as a way to drive up ad spending - the company's main source of revenue. "We believe these latest advancements in AI represent a significant opportunity for businesses to drive more efficiencies and significantly improve the experiences they offer their customers," said Meta's VP and Head of Monetization, John Hegeman, in an emailed statement to TechCrunch. "This new product group under Clara's leadership will help us bring that vision to life." Shih previously led Salesforce's AI efforts, which have not exactly been a huge success. In May, Salesforce's shares dropped the most since 2008, largely because investors feared the enterprise giant had missed out on AI boom. The enterprise giant told investors at the time it expected to have the slowest growth ever in the coming quarter. Since then, Salesforce has leaned hard into AI, releasing an AI agent developer platform called Agentforce. Its CEO, Marc Benioff, has even gone on the offensive, publicly taking shots at Microsoft's enterprise AI efforts. Salesforce did not immediately respond to TechCrunch's request for comment. It's unclear at this time who will be taking over Shih's role there. Now, it seem Shih will have a chance to start something new at Meta, a company she wrote a book about in 2009 called "The Facebook Era."

Meta hires Salesforce AI lead as head of new business AI group

Meta pledged to spend more on AI after a profit boost in its latest quarterly earnings last month. Meta has hired the former CEO of Salesforce AI, Clara Shih, to lead a new group which will build artificial intelligence (AI) tools for businesses. "Our vision for this new product group is to make cutting-edge AI accessible to every business, empowering all to find success and own their future in the AI era," Shih said in an announcement on LinkedIn yesterday (19 November). More than 200m businesses use Meta's apps, Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram to connect with consumers. Meta's Llama AI models have more than 600m downloads to date and Meta AI now has 500m monthly active users. In the company's latest profits announcement last month, it pledged to increase AI spend. At the time, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that AI advances will accelerate the company's core business and therefore more investment in AI is warranted. "Our AI investments continue to require serious infrastructure, and I expect to continue investing significantly there," he said. The business' third-quarter revenue was up 19pc to $40.59bn, the highest in recent years, which Zuckerberg attributed to the company's AI progress across its apps and business. "Meta's global reach and leadership in AI represent a generational opportunity for businesses, and I couldn't be more excited and grateful to help take this from zero to one to scale," Shih said. The exact nature of what the group will deliver is not clear, with Tech Crunch speculating that tools for creating AI-generated ads is likely. Shih, who worked at Salesforce for four years and was head of AI efforts at the company for nearly two years, has previously worked at Google and Microsoft among other major companies. She wrote about Facebook back in 2009 in her book The Facebook Era. "Social media has been the cornerstone of my career," she said. "Today truly feels like a full-circle moment." Another executive in Salesforce, Adam Evans, will succeed Shih in overseeing the company's AI efforts. Don't miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic's digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.

Meta Taps Former Salesforce AI Chief To Lead Enterprise AI Push - Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG), Salesforce (NYSE:CRM)

Meta Platforms Inc. META has appointed Clara Shih, former Salesforce Inc CRM artificial intelligence chief, to head its newly formed Business AI division, marking a significant expansion of the social media giant's AI strategy for enterprise customers. What Happened: Shih, who announced her move via LinkedIn on Tuesday, will spearhead Meta's efforts to develop AI tools for businesses using Meta's social platforms. "Our vision is to make cutting-edge AI accessible to every business, empowering all to find success and own their future in the AI era," Shih stated. The appointment comes as Meta accelerates its unique open-source AI approach, differentiating itself from competitors like Microsoft Corp. MSFT-backed OpenAI and Alphabet Inc.'s GOOG GOOGL Google. Rather than monetizing AI through direct subscriptions, Meta aims to enhance its existing advertising and social media platforms using its Llama language models. See Also: Dan Ives Expects 'Drop The Mic Performance' Tomorrow From Nvidia: Here's Why Why It Matters: Meta's AI push has gained momentum under CEO Mark Zuckerberg's leadership. During the company's third-quarter earnings call, Zuckerberg revealed plans for Llama 4, announcing an unprecedented computing infrastructure utilizing over 100,000 Nvidia Corp. NVDA H100 GPUs. The next-generation model is scheduled for release in early 2025. The company has already begun integrating AI-generated content into its platforms, including AI-created photo carousels on Facebook and AI chatbots on Instagram. Bank of America Securities recently labeled Meta an "AI Story," citing the growing adoption of Llama and Meta AI. The firm projects AI-driven advertising improvements to materialize by 2025. The move follows Meta's strong third-quarter performance, where the company exceeded analyst expectations while signaling increased capital investment in AI infrastructure. Zuckerberg has touted the company's $405 billion Llama 3.1 model as having superior cost performance compared to competing closed models. Read Next: Comcast Plans Major Cable Networks Spinoff, MSNBC And CNBC To Form New Public Company: Report Image via Pixabay Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs