Zuckerberg Says Meta’s Frontier AI Effort Should Have 50 to 100 Researchers

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said a frontier artificial intelligence effort should include 50 to 100 researchers working as a tightly coordinated group, a structure he described as central to Meta’s push toward leading AI models.

“You need 50 to 100 people, a group science project who can basically keep the whole thing in their head at once,” Zuckerberg said in an interview published Sept. 18, 2025.

Zuckerberg described the model as a high-talent-density organization with flat management and no top-down research deadlines. The structure is intended to give each researcher access to as much computing capacity as possible while Meta builds large-scale computing clusters.

“Seats on the boat are precious,” Zuckerberg said, emphasizing the value of a small, concentrated team. He also said Meta wanted to “build like we’re a frontier lab.”

Meta created Meta Superintelligence Labs to concentrate its artificial intelligence work on developing leading models. Zuckerberg said the restructuring followed concerns that Llama 4 was not progressing quickly enough toward frontier performance.

He said his role would include recruiting leading researchers, providing substantial computing resources and removing organizational obstacles.

Meta expects to spend $130 billion to $145 billion on capital expenditures in 2026, including principal payments on finance leases, as it advances its AI initiatives and products such as Muse. The company’s spending plans were previously covered in Meta’s plans for up to $145 billion in 2026 spending.