OpenAI Faces Internal Turmoil Amid Meta’s Talent Raid

OpenAI reportedly instituted a one-week company-wide shutdown in late June to address employee burnout, though the MOVE coincided with rising tensions over Meta's aggressive recruitment of its top AI researchers. The shutdown followed Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's hiring of four senior OpenAI scientists for its superintelligence lab—a poaching spree that triggered an emotional response from OpenAI leadership.

Chief Research Officer Mark Chen likened the departures to a home invasion in internal communications, revealing executives are scrambling to retain staff through compensation adjustments and countermeasures. The incident highlights the intensifying war for AI talent between tech giants pursuing divergent strategies—OpenAI's focused AGI development versus Meta's open-source ambitions.