Apple has been losing key AI researchers to rivals like Meta, OpenAI, xAI, and Cohere, with around a dozen departures announced since the beginning of the year. 

Among its rivals, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta has become a true pain in the rear end as it has aggressively targeted members from Apple’s Foundation Models (AFM) team, which develops core AI tech for products like Siri.

Meta just poached another member from the AFM team, and if the trend persists, Zuckerberg may be dipping into Tim Cook’s talent pool again soon.

Apple is lagging behind in the AI race

Apple lost its fourth AI researcher in a month to Meta, in what has become the latest setback to the company’s artificial intelligence efforts.

The talent in question, Bowen Zhang, was a key multimodal AI researcher at Apple, who exited on Friday and is reportedly set to join Meta’s superintelligence team, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Zhang’s exit is a big deal because he was part of the Apple Foundation Models group, responsible for building the core technology that supports the company’s AI platform.

His exit comes after the resignation of the leader of the AFM team, Ruoming Pang, who was lured away by Meta with a juicy compensation package of over $200 million.

The departures have caused panic among Apple’s models team as Pang played a significant role in defining the department’s road map and research direction. With his exit, multiple people within the AFM are now skeptical about its future.

Another team member — Floris Weers — left for a start-up in recent weeks.

Two other researchers from the same group — Tom Gunter and Mark Lee — also skipped town to join Meta. Gunter was one of Apple’s most senior LLM researchers, and colleagues say his deep expertise will be tough to replace.

AFM is composed of several dozen engineers and researchers across Cupertino, California and New York, but by the time Meta is done, there may be no one to hold the team up. Already, additional engineers are reportedly actively getting interviews for jobs elsewhere, and if Apple is unable to match the higher offers of its rivals, they may leave.

In an effort to lock down its remaining staff, Apple has reportedly been marginally increasing the pay of AFM staffers, regardless of whether they have threatened to leave. However, they may need to do more as the pay still pales compared to what rivals offer.

Zhifeng Chen now leads the AFM group, and she reports to Daphne Luong, head of AI research at Apple, who answers to John Giannandrea, senior vice president of AI.

Mutiny reveals eroded trust in the Apple camp.

Tim Cook is struggling to keep key contributors, and juicy offers and promises of meaningful projects are compounding his problems.

Not long ago, the company nearly lost the entire team behind MLX, its open-source machine learning framework optimized for Apple Silicon after they reportedly threatened to quit.

MLX isn’t just any side project; its success is crucial for the firm’s vision of running cutting-edge AI efficiently on its chips. Losing that team would have set it back by leagues, but the move forced the company to make counteroffers to keep them.

The mutiny was averted, but the fact that it happened at all is proof that morale in the iPhone maker’s camp is shaky and confidence in leadership is eroding.

If Apple cannot keep its staff motivated and aligned with the company’s mission, it may fall further behind in the AI race.

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