Zhao to Lead Meta’s Superintelligence Lab
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on July 25 that Shengjia Zhao, a former OpenAI research scientist and co‑creator of ChatGPT, GPT‑4 and other mini models, has joined Meta as chief scientist of the company’s newly formed Superintelligence Lab. In a Threads post, Zuckerberg said Zhao will set the research agenda for the lab and work closely with Meta’s chief AI officer Alexandr Wang, who was recruited from Scale AI after Meta took a big stake in the startup.
Zhao is one of several high‑profile researchers leaving OpenAI for Meta, highlighting the intensifying talent competition among tech giants. Meta launched the Superintelligence Lab to consolidate work on its Llama language models and pursue long‑term artificial general intelligence (AGI) goals. The lab operates separately from Meta’s FAIR research division and aims to build “full general intelligence” with the intention of open‑sourcing its results.
Implications for the AI Landscape
Zhao’s move underscores how aggressively Meta is hiring to catch up in advanced AI. According to reports, Meta has been offering some of Silicon Valley’s most lucrative compensation packages and making strategic startup investments to attract top researchers. The hiring spree follows criticism that the company’s Llama 4 model lags rivals.
By appointing one of the architects of GPT‑4, Meta signals that its Superintelligence Lab will focus on pushing the state of the art in large language models and AGI. Zhao’s involvement also raises questions about how Meta will balance open‑sourcing its work with competitive pressure and safety concerns. The appointment illustrates the growing mobility of AI talent and the high stakes companies attach to leading the next wave of AI innovation.