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Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang is the world's youngest self-made billionaire by 2025, according to Forbes. Photo: Reuters . |
In an effort to catch up with rivals in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), Meta, Facebook's parent company, announced last week a strategic investment worth $ 14.3 billion in Scale AI, a famous startup in the field of processing data to train AI systems. This is Meta's first major investment in an outside company, marking an important shift in the group's technology strategy.
Meta has made clear its ambition to reshape AI capabilities, an area where the company has been criticized for falling behind Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Anthropic. The deal is expected to provide a new impetus to an AI division that has fallen short of internal expectations.
Key personnel are deal breakers
According to CNBC , Meta's "bet" on Scale AI comes largely from bringing Alexandr Wang, the company's founder and CEO, to Meta.
A key part of the deal is that Alexandr Wang will join Meta as a senior leader in its newly created Super Intelligence Lab, a new unit created by Meta to research and develop advanced AI systems with the goal of building artificial superintelligence.
Alexandr Wang was born in New Mexico to two nuclear physicists of Chinese descent who worked at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Wang showed early mathematical genius, winning high prizes in math competitions while in high school.
He graduated from high school a year early and started working as a software engineer at Quora at age 17, where he met Scale AI co-founder Lucy Guo. Wang enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as a mathematics and computer science major, but lasted just a year before deciding to drop out to pursue entrepreneurship.
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Meta invests $14.3 billion in Scale AI. Photo: Bloomberg . |
The idea for Scale AI came from the urgent need for large-scale, accurately labeled data to train advanced AI systems. He started with an iPhone medical appointment scheduling app called Ava, and then co-founded Scale AI, which provides data labeling solutions to major tech companies and the US military.
Scale AI quickly achieved great success, becoming a tech unicorn in 2019 with a value of 7 billion USD and making Wang the youngest self-made billionaire in the world at the age of 24. With a deep insight into the pivotal role of quality data in AI development, Wang transformed Scale AI from a small idea into a global data empire, contributing to promoting the AI revolution in many fields.
Under the deal, Wang will also bring a team from Scale AI to Meta to help launch new projects. Meanwhile, Scale AI’s Chief Strategy Officer Jason Droege will take over as the startup’s new CEO. Wang will continue to serve on the board of directors.
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Scale AI is expected to help Meta's AI grow strongly. Photo: Bloomberg . |
The $14.3 billion investment, equivalent to nearly 10% of Meta's 2024 revenue, is the second-largest deal in the company's history, behind only its $19 billion acquisition of WhatsApp in 2014. It's a clear sign that Meta is stepping up its AI strategy amid fierce industry competition.
“Meta has completed its strategic partnership and investment in Scale AI. As part of the agreement, we will deepen our collaboration on data generation for AI models and Alexandr Wang will lead Meta’s superintelligence efforts,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement.
Wang also shared in a Scale AI blog post that artificial intelligence is one of the most revolutionary technologies of our time, with limitless possibilities and far-reaching implications for how people, businesses, and governments operate.
Special agreement
Notably, the structure of the deal between Meta and Scale AI is designed very differently. Meta only holds a minority stake, has no control over Scale AI’s operations, and does not interfere with the company’s strategic direction. Executives at Meta and Scale AI said this was a deliberate choice to avoid potential legal issues from regulators.
Meta is currently facing antitrust litigation over its Instagram and WhatsApp deals. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) under President Joe Biden has taken a tough stance on big tech acquisitions, especially in the AI space. As a result, deals like Amazon’s Anthropic and Microsoft’s OpenAI have been structured as “minority holdings” to avoid scrutiny.
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AI is one of Meta's development focuses. Photo: Bloomberg . |
While OpenAI has been the driving force behind the global AI wave since launching ChatGPT in late 2022, Meta is still struggling to establish itself in this competitive game. Despite opting for an open-source strategy to encourage community development, Meta’s latest AI system, LLAMA4, is still considered not to be competitive with leading models from its rivals.
The establishment of the Artificial Superintelligence Lab and the hiring of Alexandr Wang are seen as a major boost for Meta in regaining momentum. In the tech world, superintelligence is seen as the next stage of AI development, where systems not only achieve the ability to think like humans (AGI) but also excel in speed, accuracy, and level of awareness.
Source: https://znews.vn/meta-rot-them-tien-ti-vao-ai-post1560588.html
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