Meta Platforms Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg has told employees that the company’s progress in developing artificial intelligence (AI) agents has been slower than expected, even as it significantly increases spending on AI infrastructure.
According to Reuters, which cited an internal town hall recording on Thursday, Zuckerberg acknowledged that development over the past four months had not “accelerated in the way we expected”, prompting the company to reassess its recent organisational restructuring.
He explained that Meta’s leadership had earlier this year been concerned that the company was not moving quickly enough to keep pace with rapid advances in AI. Executives had also been optimistic about the potential of AI-assisted software development tools, including Anthropic’s Claude Code, to boost engineering productivity. However, those expectations have yet to be realised, he said.
Despite the slower-than-expected progress, Zuckerberg remains confident that Meta’s substantial AI investments will begin to deliver stronger results in the coming months. He told employees he expects more meaningful returns within the next three to six months.
Meta is projected to spend as much as US$145 billion on AI infrastructure this year, underscoring its commitment to expanding its AI capabilities amid an industry-wide race among major technology companies to build increasingly powerful AI models and applications.
The company’s investment forms part of a broader wave of spending across the technology sector, as firms compete to develop advanced AI systems capable of automating complex tasks and enhancing productivity.
In a separate development, Meta Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth addressed concerns surrounding a paused employee activity-tracking programme. He said an internal review had concluded that no employee data collected through the programme had been used to train the company’s AI models.
The comments come as Meta continues to invest aggressively in AI while seeking to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its research and product development efforts in an increasingly competitive market.
