As portion of the investment, Meta volition ramp up hiring for artificial quality roles and physique a much than 2-gigawatt information halfway that would beryllium ample capable to screen a important portion of Manhattan. (Reuters)
Meta Platforms plans to walk arsenic overmuch arsenic $65 cardinal this twelvemonth to grow its AI infrastructure, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said connected Friday, aiming to bolster the company’s presumption against rivals OpenAI and Google successful the contention to predominate the technology.
As portion of the investment, Meta volition ramp up hiring for artificial quality roles and physique a much than 2-gigawatt information halfway that would beryllium ample capable to screen a important portion of Manhattan.
The institution — among the apical buyers of Nvidia’s sought-after AI chips — aims to extremity the twelvemonth with implicit 1.3 cardinal graphics processors and plans to bring astir 1 GW of computing powerfulness online successful 2025.
“This volition beryllium a defining twelvemonth for AI,” Zuckerberg said successful a Facebook post. “This is simply a monolithic effort, and implicit the coming years it volition thrust our halfway products and business.”
Big exertion firms person been investing tens of billions of dollars to make AI infrastructure aft the occurrence of OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Meta’s announcement comes conscionable days aft US President Donald Trump announced that OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle volition signifier a task called Stargate and put $500 cardinal successful AI infrastructure crossed the US.
Earlier this month, Microsoft said it was readying to put astir $80 cardinal successful fiscal 2025 to make information centers, portion Amazon.com has said its 2025 spending would beryllium higher than an estimated $75 cardinal successful 2024.
“Zuckerberg is signaling to the marketplace helium does not privation to beryllium 2nd successful the AI race. The timing of the announcement was apt impacted by Stargate, which created urgency astir sending a message,” D.A. Davidson expert Gil Luria said.
Shares of Meta were trading 1% higher.
The institution has emerged arsenic a large subordinate successful the AI contention with its AI chatbot, Ray-Ban astute glasses and open-source approach, which sets it isolated from rivals by allowing consumers and astir businesses to usage its Llama AI models for free.
Zuckerberg expects Meta’s AI adjunct — disposable crossed its services — to service much than 1 cardinal radical successful 2025, up from astir 600 cardinal monthly progressive users it had past year.
The $60 cardinal to $65 cardinal superior spending outlined for 2025 would people a important leap from the company’s estimated expenditure of $38 cardinal to $40 cardinal for past year. It is besides supra analysts’ estimation of $50.25 cardinal successful 2025, according to LSEG data.
Meta is acceptable to study its fourth-quarter results connected Jan. 29.