24-year-old AI researcher Matt Deitke initially declined a $125 million offer from Meta but later accepted a $250 million package to lead their Superintelligence team.
The pace of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology adoption has accelerated since the beginning of 2025. Today, countless people use AI technology. Along with this, the AI race in the world of technology has also increased tremendously. In such a scenario, many companies are striving to get ahead in the AI field. Meta owner Mark Zuckerberg is also in the race to become the uncrowned king of the AI world. Zuckerberg is recruiting major researchers to lead his ‘Meta AI.’ He is spending a lot of money for it. New reports suggest that Mark Zuckerberg has become a big fan of a 24-year-old AI researcher and has offered him millions to bring him to Meta AI.
The New York Times reports that Meta initially offered Matt Deitke, a 24-year-old AI researcher, $125 million, or about Rs 1000 crore. But Matt Deitke rejected this offer from Mark Zuckerberg’s company. The New York Times reports that Deitke initially declined Meta’s offer of approximately $125 million (approximately Rs 1,098 crore) over four years. Matt Deitke’s decision was to focus on his rapidly growing AI startup, Vercept. With this, Mark Zuckerberg himself came to see this young man. He offered Matt $250 million, or about Rs 2200 crore. That is, double the initial offer. Reports suggest that this offer prompted Deitke to join Meta’s Superintelligence team as an AI researcher.
Who is Matt Deitke? Why was Zuckerberg so determined to bring him to Meta’s Superintelligence project?
Matt Deitke is now considered one of the most sought-after names in the AI market. He left academia during his PhD research at the University of Washington to join the Allen Institute for AI (AI2) in Seattle. There, Matt Deitke led the development of MoMo, a cutting-edge multimodal chatbot capable of processing not only text but also images and audio. Matt Deitke’s work on MoMo earned him the Best Paper Award at NeurIPS 2022, one of the most prestigious conferences in the AI field.
Meta had been trying to recruit Matt Deitke since late 2023. However, he initially declined these offers. However, international media reports that Deitke decided to join Meta’s Superintelligence Lab after Zuckerberg’s personal intervention and an increased salary package. Meta Superintelligence Lab has already invested over a billion to build an all-star AI team.
Meta Superintelligence Lab is acquiring top talent who have worked with rivals like OpenAI, Google, and Apple by spending huge sums. However, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg says with a smile that many of them have not been paid as much as is being said. Whatever the truth, the current topic of discussion in the AI field is 24-year-old Matt Deitke.