Mark Zuckerberg has assembled some of his fellow tech chiefs into an advisory council to guide Meta on its artificial intelligence and product developments.
The Meta Advisory Group will periodically meet with Meta’s management team, Bloomberg reported. Its members include: Stripe CEO and co-founder Patrick Collison, former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke, and former Microsoft executive and investor Charlie Songhurst.
“I’ve come to deeply respect this group of people and their achievements in their respective areas, and I’m grateful that they’re willing to share their perspectives with Meta at such an important time as we take on new opportunities with AI and the metaverse,” Zuckerberg wrote in an internal note to Meta employees, according to Bloomberg.
The advisory council differs from Meta’s 11-person board of directors because its members are not elected by shareholders, nor do they have fiduciary duty to Meta, a Meta spokesperson told Bloomberg. The spokesperson said that the men will not be paid for their roles on the advisory council.
“This advisory group is tasked with offering insights and recommendations on technological advancements, innovation and strategic growth opportunities,” the spokesperson told Bloomberg. Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment by Quartz.
Meta is spending billions on chips to build on its AI ambitions, and is developing an AI model to power recommendations for its video ecosystem and user feeds as part of its “technology roadmap” from now until 2026. Last month, Meta put its AI assistant on all of its platforms, including Facebook and Instagram. The company called its Meta AI “the most intelligent AI assistant you can use for free.”
In addition to spending billions on chips, Zuckerberg has reportedly spent time writing personal emails to researchers at Google’s DeepMind, convincing them to work with him at Meta. The company has even offered jobs to candidates without interviews, and stepped back on its policy of not offering higher salaries to talent who have job offers from competitors, The Information reported.