This moves comes just months after Murati made headlines for refusing a reported $1 billion job offer from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg . In a dramatic turn of events in the ongoing AI talent wars, Soumith Chintala, one of Meta’s most influential AI leaders and co-creator of the widely used PyTorch framework, has joined Thinking Machines Lab, the AI startup founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati.
As a recent report by Wired said that Thinking Machine Labs rejected staggering $1 billion offer from Meta to join its Superintelligence Lab. The compensation packages ranged from $200 million to $1 billion over multiple years—to lure top AI researchers from Murati’s startup. In the lengthy post shared he praised his team and departure marks the end of an 11-year run at Meta, where he spent nearly eight years leading PyTorch’s development. Almost eight years leading PyTorch, taking it from nothing to 90%+ adoption in AI. Thinking Machines Lab, the artificial intelligence startup founded by former OpenAI executive Mira Murati, is reportedly in early discussions to raise a new round of funding at a valuation of roughly $50 billion.
One of the top researcher as Meta Soumith Chintala has confirmed his new role at Thinking Machines Lab via posts shared on X (formerly known as Twitter) and LinkedIn. The new financing, which has not been previously reported, would more than quadruple the startup’s valuation from July and catapult Thinking Machines into the upper ranks of the most valuable private companies less than a year after it launched, according to a report in Bloomberg.
But as she declined to sell her company despite a $1 billion offer, Mark Zuckerberg “responded by launching a full-scale raid,” reports the Wall Street Journal (WSJ). Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the report says, approached more than a dozen of Thinking Machines’ 50 employees in the following weeks “to sound them out about jumping ship”. One of his main targets was Andrew Tulloch, a leading researcher and co-founder of the startup, according to the publication.
For those unaware, Meta tried to buy OpenAI’s former Chief Technology Officer (CTO) Mira Murati startup, Thinking Machines Lab. “I’m stepping down from PyTorch and leaving Meta on November 17th. Eleven years at Meta. Nearly all my professional life. Making many friends for life. Walking away from this was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. But I’m leaving with a full heart,” wrote Chintala.