Meta AI Unit Faces Internal Disruption After Staff Transfers

Meta transferred about 7,000 employees to AI-focused teams during its most recent round of layoffs last month. Roughly 8,000 additional employees were let go, representing 10 percent of the company's workforce. The transfers included staff reassigned to Meta's applied AI engineering unit, which supports the company's Meta Superintelligence Labs.

Employees in that unit have described their new tasks as less challenging than prior work and said they had no choice in the reassignment.

During an employee-only meeting last week, one participant interrupted the call and directed staff to contact a Meta AI executive with a profane message. The same person referred to the company using an expletive before the line went silent. Workers told reporters that the new assignments involve fine-tuning AI models and completing tasks when automated systems cannot.

Several employees said the work felt routine and left them without a sense of agency.

Meta has also begun monitoring employee laptop usage to help train AI systems. Some staff members said the combination of reassignments and monitoring has contributed to lower morale. The company has reported strong financial results in recent quarters, driven largely by its advertising business rather than its AI projects.