Meta's Aggressive AI Talent Hunt and Superintelligence Push: High Costs, Uncertain Returns

Meta's AI Recruiting Campaign Finds a New Target

Mark Zuckerberg is on a warpath to recruit top talent in the AI field for his newly formed Meta Superintelligence Labs. After trying to gut OpenAI (and successfully poaching several top researchers), he appears to have set his sights on his next target. More than a dozen people at Mira Murati's 50-person startup, Thinking Machines Lab, have been approached or received offers from the tech giant. (Murati, for those who don't remember, was previously the chief technology officer at OpenAI.) One of those offers was more than $1 billion over a multi-year span, a source with knowledge of the negotiations tells WIRED. The rest were between $200 million and $500 million over a four-year span, multiple sources confirm. In the first year alone, some staffers were guaranteed to make between $50 million and $100 million, sources say (a spokesperson for the lab declined to comment). So far at Thinking Machines Lab, not a single person has taken the offer. Meta communications director Andy Stone disputed this reporting in a statement to WIRED. "We made offers only to a handful of people at TML and while there was one sizable offer, the details are off," he said. "At the end of the day, this all begs the question who is spinning this narrative and why." Zuckerberg's initial outreach is low-key, according to messages viewed by WIRED. In some cases, he sent recruits a direct message on WhatsApp asking to talk. From there, the interviews move fast -- a long call with the CEO himself, followed by conversations with chief technology officer Andrew "Boz" Bosworth and other Meta executives. Here's a pre-Meta Superintelligence Labs recruiting message Zuckerberg sent to a potential recruit (the tone hasn't changed much today): "We've been following your work on advancing technology and the benefits of AI for everyone over the years. We're making some important investments across research, products and our infrastructure in order to build the most valuable AI products and services for people. We're optimistic that everyone who uses our services will have a world-class AI assistant to help get things done, every creator will have an AI their community can engage with, every business will have an AI their customers can interact with to buy things and get support, and every developer will have a state-of-the-art open source model to build with. We want to bring the best people to Meta, and we would love to share more about what we are building." During these conversations, Boz has been upfront about his vision for how Meta will compete with OpenAI. While the tech giant has lagged behind its smaller competitor in building cutting-edge models, it is willing to use its open source strategy to undercut OpenAI, sources say. The idea is that Meta can commoditize the technology by releasing open source models that directly compete with the ChatGPT maker. "The pressure has always been there since the start of this year, and I think we saw that culminate with Llama 4 being rushed out of the door," a source at Meta tells me. The rollout of Meta's latest family of models was delayed due to struggles improving its performance, and once it was released, there was a lot of drama about the company appearing to game a benchmark to make other models appear better than they actually were.

Meta's year of bold 'superintelligence' bets unlikely to pump profits

July 29 (Reuters) - It's crunch time for Mark Zuckerberg as he pulls out all the stops to stay relevant in Silicon Valley's intensifying advanced artificial intelligence race. The Meta (META.O), opens new tab CEO has sparked a billion-dollar talent war, aggressively poaching researchers from rivals including OpenAI. But as Meta's spending rises, so does the pressure it faces to deliver returns. For the second quarter, though, Wall Street is bracing for disappointment as the company is set to report its slowest profit growth in two years on Wednesday, rising by 11.5% to $15.01 billion, as operating costs jump nearly 9%. Revenue, too, likely grew at its slowest pace in seven quarters in that period, up an expected 14.7% to $44.80 billion, according to an average analyst estimate from LSEG. While Zuckerberg is no stranger to high-stakes pursuits - Meta's augmented-reality unit has burned more than $60 billion since 2020 - his latest push comes with added urgency because of the underwhelming performance of the company's large language Llama 4 model. He recently pledged hundreds of billions of dollars to build massive AI data centers and shelled out $14.3 billion for a stake in startup Scale AI, poaching its 28-year-old billionaire CEO Alexandr Wang, even as Meta continued to lay off people. Investors have largely backed Zuckerberg's frenzied pursuit of superintelligence - a hypothetical concept where AI surpasses human intelligence in every possible way - pushing the company's stock up more than a fifth so far this year. But they will watch if Meta further increases its capital expenditure for the year after boosting it in April. Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab also upped the ante last week, increasing its annual capex forecast by 13% to $85 billion due to surging demand for its AI-powered Google Cloud services. "We view rising capex as positive given... Meta can become a one-stop shop for many marketing departments," said Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot, which holds Meta shares. Lagging efforts from Alphabet's Google DeepMind and OpenAI, Meta launched a Superintelligence Lab last month that will work in parallel to Meta AI, the company's established AI research division, led by deep learning pioneer, Yann LeCun. To differentiate its efforts, Zuckerberg has promised to release Meta's AI work as open source and touted that superintelligence can become a mainstream consumer product through devices like Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses, rather than a purely enterprise-focused technology. The strategy plays to Meta's strengths, analysts say, pointing to its more than 3-billion strong social media user base and engagement gains in recent years, driven by AI-enhanced content targeting. Still, Meta's mainstay advertising market is under threat from advertisers pulling back spending in the face of President Donald Trump's tariffs, and tough competition from Chinese-owned TikTok, whose U.S. ban now seems unlikely. Some advertisers may have leaned on proven platforms such as Meta amid the uncertainty, but that will not shield the company from questions over its superintelligence ambitions and how they fit into its broader business strategy, said Minda Smiley, senior analyst at eMarketer. "While Meta has seen massive gains from incorporating AI into its ad platform and algorithms, its attempts to directly compete with the likes of OpenAI are proving to be more challenging while costing it billions of dollars." Questions remain about when superintelligence can be achieved, a timeline Zuckerberg admits is uncertain. Meta's LeCun is also a known skeptic of the large language model path to superintelligence. "Meta's AI strategy today is more cohesive than in 2023, but there's still a sense the company is still searching for direction," MoffettNathanson analysts said. Reporting by Jaspreet Singh and Aditya Soni in Bengaluru; Editing by Sayantani Ghosh and Pooja Desai Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

Meta's AI spending spree is Wall Street's focus in second-quarter earnings

Alexandr Wang, CEO of ScaleAI speaks on CNBC's Squawk Box outside the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on Jan. 23, 2025. Zuckerberg believes that new AI talent as part of the Superintelligence unit is worth it if Meta can regain its momentum and potentially create more powerful AI technology that steamrolls the competition, CNBC reported in June. For Meta, Llama 4 represented the company's answer to competing models from rivals like OpenAI, and executives have viewed it as helping the company dominate a potential computing platform of the future. Similar to other Meta-incubated technologies like the PyTorch AI developer tools, the company released Llama to the open-source community, which can then access and use the software for free, subject to certain licensing terms. While the predecessor, Llama 3, was a hit with developers, they haven't taken to Llama 4 because it's seen by some as more difficult to customize and integrate into their apps. That's resulted in many coders preferring Llama 3 over its successor, people familiar with the matter said. Additionally, Zuckerberg lost confidence in his generative AI team and its leadership in part due to a controversy over whether Meta may have gamed certain industry AI benchmark tests, the people said. Llama 4's struggles can be traced back to January, when the sudden rise and ensuing popularity of the open-source R1 AI model by DeepSeek caught Meta off guard, leading to a reevaluation of Llama's underlying architecture, the people said. DeepSeek's R1 is a so-called mixture-of-experts AI model, or MoE. R1 is similar to OpenAI's o1 family of models that can be trained to excel at multistep tasks like solving math equations or writing code. By contrast, Llama's models -- before their latest release - were dense AI models, which are generally simpler for most AI developers to fine-tune and incorporate into their own apps, the people said. AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic, researchers say, have been pushing MoE models to power AI agents that can perform a variety of step-by-step tasks. Those companies keep their designs closely guarded from competitors. OpenAI has been developing an AI model for the open-source community, but CEO Sam Altman said earlier this month that its debut is delayed indefinitely pending safety tests and other reviews. Although Meta has previously published research on MoE models, DeepSeek's release to the open-source community wowed researchers because R1 appeared to be less expensive to train and run compared with other AI models, experts said. Suddenly, Meta executives thought they had a clearer picture into how to create their own efficient and possibly cheaper MoE models, potentially leapfrogging rivals like OpenAI, people familiar with the matter said. Still, some staff members in Meta's GenAI unit pushed for Llama 4 to remain a dense AI model, which though generally less efficient, is still powerful, and Meta originally planned on that architecture acting as the backbone supporting improved voice recognition capabilities, the people said. Ultimately, Meta went with the MoE approach, due in part to DeepSeek's innovations and the promise of pulling ahead of OpenAI, the people said. Meta released two small versions in April and said a "Behemoth" version would come at a later date. But the new MoE architecture disappointed some developers, who were simply hoping Llama 4 would be a souped-up version of Llama 3, people familiar with the matter said. Llama 4 also failed to deliver a significant leap over competing open-source models from China, the people said. Executives at Meta as well as the Superintelligence Labs' high-profile hires are now questioning the company's current open-source AI strategy, and have considered skipping the release of Behemoth in favor of developing a more powerful proprietary AI model, the people said. A Meta spokesperson said in a statement that the company's "position on open source AI is unchanged." "We plan to continue releasing leading open source models," the spokesperson said. "We haven't released everything we've developed historically and we expect to continue training a mix of open and closed models going forward." The New York Times first reported that Meta was considering upending its open-source AI strategy. Despite Meta's AI struggles, the company's core online ad business remains strong, and investors are hopeful that the recent AI investments and hiring will eventually pay off. Zuckerberg said in July that the company would invest "hundreds of billions of dollars" into building out the computing infrastructure needed to power cutting-edge AI projects. "Meta Superintelligence Labs will have industry-leading levels of compute and by far the greatest compute per researcher," Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post. Analysts at Bank of America said in a note this month that Zuckerberg's comments indicate "a sign of confidence in Meta's revenue trajectory." The analysts said that his statement also "implies higher future Capex and Opex," which potentially equates to even more AI spending. "We also see the post as reaching out to AI talent, signaling Meta as a place for AI innovation," the analysts wrote. "We expect AI investment to be a top focus area on the upcoming earnings call, and Meta likely needs to make a case for strong AI returns to drive multiple expansion." Meta and its rivals' pursuit of AI researchers echoes the self-driving car frenzy of 2017, when companies like Google and Uber competed fiercely for talent, doling out "similarly crazy kind of pay packages across the board," said Megh Gautam, chief product officer at deal-tracking firm Crunchbase. "The dynamics still feel very much like a winner-take-all-market, so you're trying your best to give yourself the best shot possible to go make that happen," Gautam said. Investors appear more receptive to Meta's AI spending and strategy shifts, a contrast with a few years ago when the company was heavily pushing the metaverse, said Uday Cheruvu, an analyst and portfolio manager at Harding Loevner, which owns Meta shares. OpenAI, Google and Anthropic are also trying to hire and maintain talent all while continuing to spend billions of dollars on developing their respective AI models, Cheruvu said. "Now with AI, it's not just Meta - everyone else is doing it, so now the euphoria is much higher," Cheruvu said.

Meta's Year of Bold 'Superintelligence' Bets Unlikely to Pump Profits

By Jaspreet Singh and Aditya Soni (Reuters) -It's crunch time for Mark Zuckerberg as he pulls out all the stops to stay relevant in Silicon Valley's intensifying advanced artificial intelligence race. The Meta CEO has sparked a billion-dollar talent war, aggressively poaching researchers from rivals including OpenAI. But as Meta's spending rises, so does the pressure it faces to deliver returns. For the second quarter, though, Wall Street is bracing for disappointment as the company is set to report its slowest profit growth in two years on Wednesday, rising by 11.5% to $15.01 billion, as operating costs jump nearly 9%. Revenue, too, likely grew at its slowest pace in seven quarters in that period, up an expected 14.7% to $44.80 billion, according to an average analyst estimate from LSEG. While Zuckerberg is no stranger to high-stakes pursuits - Meta's augmented-reality unit has burned more than $60 billion since 2020 - his latest push comes with added urgency because of the underwhelming performance of the company's large language Llama 4 model. He recently pledged hundreds of billions of dollars to build massive AI data centers and shelled out $14.3 billion for a stake in startup Scale AI, poaching its 28-year-old billionaire CEO Alexandr Wang, even as Meta continued to lay off people. Investors have largely backed Zuckerberg's frenzied pursuit of superintelligence - a hypothetical concept where AI surpasses human intelligence in every possible way - pushing the company's stock up more than a fifth so far this year. But they will watch if Meta further increases its capital expenditure for the year after boosting it in April. Alphabet also upped the ante last week, increasing its annual capex forecast by 13% to $85 billion due to surging demand for its AI-powered Google Cloud services. "We view rising capex as positive given... Meta can become a one-stop shop for many marketing departments," said Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot, which holds Meta shares. Lagging efforts from Alphabet's Google DeepMind and OpenAI, Meta launched a Superintelligence Lab last month that will work in parallel to Meta AI, the company's established AI research division, led by deep learning pioneer, Yann LeCun. To differentiate its efforts, Zuckerberg has promised to release Meta's AI work as open source and touted that superintelligence can become a mainstream consumer product through devices like Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses, rather than a purely enterprise-focused technology. The strategy plays to Meta's strengths, analysts say, pointing to its more than 3-billion strong social media user base and engagement gains in recent years, driven by AI-enhanced content targeting. Still, Meta's mainstay advertising market is under threat from advertisers pulling back spending in the face of President Donald Trump's tariffs, and tough competition from Chinese-owned TikTok, whose U.S. ban now seems unlikely. Some advertisers may have leaned on proven platforms such as Meta amid the uncertainty, but that will not shield the company from questions over its superintelligence ambitions and how they fit into its broader business strategy, said Minda Smiley, senior analyst at eMarketer. "While Meta has seen massive gains from incorporating AI into its ad platform and algorithms, its attempts to directly compete with the likes of OpenAI are proving to be more challenging while costing it billions of dollars." Questions remain about when superintelligence can be achieved, a timeline Zuckerberg admits is uncertain. Meta's LeCun is also a known skeptic of the large language model path to superintelligence. "Meta's AI strategy today is more cohesive than in 2023, but there's still a sense the company is still searching for direction," MoffettNathanson analysts said. (Reporting by Jaspreet Singh and Aditya Soni in Bengaluru; Editing by Sayantani Ghosh and Pooja Desai)

Meta's year of bold 'superintelligence' bets unlikely to pump profits - The Economic Times

It's crunch time for Mark Zuckerberg as he pulls out all the stops to stay relevant in Silicon Valley's intensifying advanced artificial intelligence race. The Meta CEO has sparked a billion-dollar talent war, aggressively poaching researchers from rivals including OpenAI. But as Meta's spending rises, so does the pressure it faces to deliver returns. For the second quarter, though, Wall Street is bracing for disappointment as the company is set to report its slowest profit growth in two years on Wednesday, rising by 11.5% to $15.01 billion, as operating costs jump nearly 9%. Revenue, too, likely grew at its slowest pace in seven quarters in that period, up an expected 14.7% to $44.80 billion, according to an average analyst estimate from LSEG. While Zuckerberg is no stranger to high-stakes pursuits - Meta's augmented-reality unit has burned more than $60 billion since 2020 - his latest push comes with added urgency because of the underwhelming performance of the company's large language Llama 4 model. He recently pledged hundreds of billions of dollars to build massive AI data centers and shelled out $14.3 billion for a stake in startup Scale AI, poaching its 28-year-old billionaire CEO Alexandr Wang, even as Meta continued to lay off people. Investors have largely backed Zuckerberg's frenzied pursuit of superintelligence - a hypothetical concept where AI surpasses human intelligence in every possible way - pushing the company's stock up more than a fifth so far this year. But they will watch if Meta further increases its capital expenditure for the year after boosting it in April. Alphabet also upped the ante last week, increasing its annual capex forecast by 13% to $85 billion due to surging demand for its AI-powered Google Cloud services. "We view rising capex as positive given... Meta can become a one-stop shop for many marketing departments," said Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot, which holds Meta shares. Lagging efforts from Alphabet's Google DeepMind and OpenAI, Meta launched a Superintelligence Lab last month that will work in parallel to Meta AI, the company's established AI research division, led by deep learning pioneer, Yann LeCun. To differentiate its efforts, Zuckerberg has promised to release Meta's AI work as open source and touted that superintelligence can become a mainstream consumer product through devices like Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses, rather than a purely enterprise-focused technology. The strategy plays to Meta's strengths, analysts say, pointing to its more than 3-billion strong social media user base and engagement gains in recent years, driven by AI-enhanced content targeting. Still, Meta's mainstay advertising market is under threat from advertisers pulling back spending in the face of President Donald Trump's tariffs, and tough competition from Chinese-owned TikTok, whose U.S. ban now seems unlikely. Some advertisers may have leaned on proven platforms such as Meta amid the uncertainty, but that will not shield the company from questions over its superintelligence ambitions and how they fit into its broader business strategy, said Minda Smiley, senior analyst at eMarketer. "While Meta has seen massive gains from incorporating AI into its ad platform and algorithms, its attempts to directly compete with the likes of OpenAI are proving to be more challenging while costing it billions of dollars." Questions remain about when superintelligence can be achieved, a timeline Zuckerberg admits is uncertain. Meta's LeCun is also a known skeptic of the large language model path to superintelligence. "Meta's AI strategy today is more cohesive than in 2023, but there's still a sense the company is still searching for direction," MoffettNathanson analysts said.

After OpenAI And Google, Mark Zuckerberg Sets Sights On This 50-Person Startup, Offering Billions To Lure Top Talent: Report - Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Meta Platform's META CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is reportedly on a mission to recruit top AI researchers from Thinking Machines Lab for his new venture, Meta Superintelligence Labs. What Happened: Zuckerberg's Meta Superintelligence Labs is making aggressive moves to acquire leading AI talent from Thinking Machines Lab. The Meta CEO has already successfully attracted several top researchers from OpenAI, and now he is targeting the talent pool at Thinking Machines Lab, Wired reported. Check out the current price of META stock here. Thinking Machines Lab, a 50-person startup led by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, has seen over a dozen of its employees approached by Meta, with some receiving offers exceeding $1 billion over multiple years. Other proposals ranged from $200 million to $500 million over four years, with some employees reportedly assured payouts of $50 million to $100 million in the first year alone. Despite the substantial offers, no one from Thinking Machines Lab has accepted the offers. Meta's communications director, Andy Stone, disputed the report, stating that they had made offers to only a few individuals at TML, with the details being misrepresented. Sources told the publication, Meta aims to challenge OpenAI by releasing open-source models that rival those of the ChatGPT creator, effectively turning the technology into a commodity. SEE ALSO: Bitcoin Could Go To $300,000 Before 'Great Depression' Crisis, Traders Argue - Benzinga Why It Matters: Zuckerberg's aggressive recruitment tactics have been a subject of discussion in the tech industry. Meta has been aggressively expanding its AI dominance through its Superintelligence Labs (MSL), launched in June 2025 to pursue artificial general intelligence (AGI). Trending Investment OpportunitiesAdvertisementArrivedBuy shares of homes and vacation rentals for as little as $100. Get StartedWiserAdvisorGet matched with a trusted, local financial advisor for free.Get StartedPoint.comTap into your home's equity to consolidate debt or fund a renovation.Get StartedRobinhoodMove your 401k to Robinhood and get a 3% match on deposits.Get Started The company has poached top talent from OpenAI, Anthropic, Alphabet Inc's GOOGL Google DeepMin, and Apple Inc AAPL, reshaping the AI landscape in a fierce talent war. Last week, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman responded to Meta's recruitment tactics, which he likened to "mafioso" moves. Altman welcomed the competition, stating a defiant "bring it on" in response to Meta's billion-dollar hiring spree. Benzinga's Edge Rankings place Meta in the 90th percentile for quality and the 93rd percentile for growth, reflecting strong performance in both areas. Check the detailed report here. READ MORE: Mark Zuckerberg's Meta Shuts Down EU Political Ads On Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp -- Calls New Rules 'Unworkable' Image via Shutterstock Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. AAPLApple Inc$211.580.15%Stock Score Locked: Edge Members Only Benzinga Rankings give you vital metrics on any stock - anytime. Unlock RankingsEdge RankingsMomentum30.66Growth32.82Quality77.60Value9.38Price TrendShortMediumLongOverviewGOOGLAlphabet Inc$195.08-0.34%METAMeta Platforms Inc$706.670.95%Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs

Meta's year of bold 'superintelligence' bets unlikely to pump profits

The Meta CEO has sparked a billion-dollar talent war, aggressively poaching researchers from rivals including OpenAI. But as Meta's spending rises, so does the pressure it faces to deliver returns. For the second quarter, though, Wall Street is bracing for disappointment as the company is set to report its slowest profit growth in two years on Wednesday, rising by 11.5 per cent to US$15.01 billion, as operating costs jump nearly nine per cent. Revenue, too, likely grew at its slowest pace in seven quarters in that period, up an expected 14.7 per cent to US$44.80 billion, according to an average analyst estimate from LSEG. While Zuckerberg is no stranger to high-stakes pursuits - Meta's augmented-reality unit has burned more than US$60 billion since 2020 - his latest push comes with added urgency because of the underwhelming performance of the company's large language Llama 4 model. He recently pledged hundreds of billions of dollars to build massive AI data centers and shelled out US$14.3 billion for a stake in startup Scale AI, poaching its 28-year-old billionaire CEO Alexandr Wang, even as Meta continued to lay off people. Investors have largely backed Zuckerberg's frenzied pursuit of superintelligence - a hypothetical concept where AI surpasses human intelligence in every possible way - pushing the company's stock up more than a fifth so far this year. But they will watch if Meta further increases its capital expenditure for the year after boosting it in April. Alphabet GOOGL.O also upped the ante last week, increasing its annual capex forecastby 13 per cent to US$85 billion due to surging demand for its AI-powered Google Cloud services. "We view rising capex as positive given... Meta can become a one-stop shop for many marketing departments," said Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot, which holds Meta shares. Lagging efforts from Alphabet's Google DeepMind and OpenAI, Meta launched a Superintelligence Lab last month that will work in parallel to Meta AI, the company's established AI research division, led by deep learning pioneer, Yann LeCun. To differentiate its efforts, Zuckerberg has promised to release Meta's AI work as open source and touted that superintelligence can become a mainstream consumer product through devices like Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses, rather than a purely enterprise-focused technology. The strategy plays to Meta's strengths, analysts say, pointing to its more than 3-billion strong social media user base and engagement gains in recent years, driven by AI-enhanced content targeting. Still, Meta's mainstay advertising market is under threat from advertisers pulling back spending in the face of President Donald Trump's tariffs, and tough competition from Chinese-owned TikTok, whose U.S. ban now seems unlikely. Some advertisers may have leaned on proven platforms such as Meta amid the uncertainty, but that will not shield the company from questions over its superintelligence ambitions and how they fit into its broader business strategy, said Minda Smiley, senior analyst at eMarketer. "While Meta has seen massive gains from incorporating AI into its ad platform and algorithms, its attempts to directly compete with the likes of OpenAI are proving to be more challenging while costing it billions of dollars." Questions remain about when superintelligence can be achieved, a timeline Zuckerberg admits is uncertain. Meta's LeCun is also a known skeptic of the large language model path to superintelligence. "Meta's AI strategy today is more cohesive than in 2023, but there's still a sense the company is still searching for direction," MoffettNathanson analysts said. ---

Meta's year of bold 'superintelligence' bets unlikely to pump profits

(Reuters) -It's crunch time for Mark Zuckerberg as he pulls out all the stops to stay relevant in Silicon Valley's intensifying advanced artificial intelligence race. The Meta CEO has sparked a billion-dollar talent war, aggressively poaching researchers from rivals including OpenAI. But as Meta's spending rises, so does the pressure it faces to deliver returns. For the second quarter, though, Wall Street is bracing for disappointment as the company is set to report its slowest profit growth in two years on Wednesday, rising by 11.5% to $15.01 billion, as operating costs jump nearly 9%. Revenue, too, likely grew at its slowest pace in seven quarters in that period, up an expected 14.7% to $44.80 billion, according to an average analyst estimate from LSEG. While Zuckerberg is no stranger to high-stakes pursuits - Meta's augmented-reality unit has burned more than $60 billion since 2020 - his latest push comes with added urgency because of the underwhelming performance of the company's large language Llama 4 model. He recently pledged hundreds of billions of dollars to build massive AI data centers and shelled out $14.3 billion for a stake in startup Scale AI, poaching its 28-year-old billionaire CEO Alexandr Wang, even as Meta continued to lay off people. Investors have largely backed Zuckerberg's frenzied pursuit of superintelligence - a hypothetical concept where AI surpasses human intelligence in every possible way - pushing the company's stock up more than a fifth so far this year. But they will watch if Meta further increases its capital expenditure for the year after boosting it in April. Alphabet also upped the ante last week, increasing its annual capex forecast by 13% to $85 billion due to surging demand for its AI-powered Google Cloud services. "We view rising capex as positive given... Meta can become a one-stop shop for many marketing departments," said Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot, which holds Meta shares. Lagging efforts from Alphabet's Google DeepMind and OpenAI, Meta launched a Superintelligence Lab last month that will work in parallel to Meta AI, the company's established AI research division, led by deep learning pioneer, Yann LeCun. To differentiate its efforts, Zuckerberg has promised to release Meta's AI work as open source and touted that superintelligence can become a mainstream consumer product through devices like Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses, rather than a purely enterprise-focused technology. The strategy plays to Meta's strengths, analysts say, pointing to its more than 3-billion strong social media user base and engagement gains in recent years, driven by AI-enhanced content targeting. Still, Meta's mainstay advertising market is under threat from advertisers pulling back spending in the face of President Donald Trump's tariffs, and tough competition from Chinese-owned TikTok, whose U.S. ban now seems unlikely. Some advertisers may have leaned on proven platforms such as Meta amid the uncertainty, but that will not shield the company from questions over its superintelligence ambitions and how they fit into its broader business strategy, said Minda Smiley, senior analyst at eMarketer. "While Meta has seen massive gains from incorporating AI into its ad platform and algorithms, its attempts to directly compete with the likes of OpenAI are proving to be more challenging while costing it billions of dollars." Questions remain about when superintelligence can be achieved, a timeline Zuckerberg admits is uncertain. Meta's LeCun is also a known skeptic of the large language model path to superintelligence. "Meta's AI strategy today is more cohesive than in 2023, but there's still a sense the company is still searching for direction," MoffettNathanson analysts said. (Reporting by Jaspreet Singh and Aditya Soni in Bengaluru; Editing by Sayantani Ghosh and Pooja Desai)