Meta’s vice president for AI research, Joelle Pineau, said she is leaving the company at the end of May after working 8 years for it.

Amidst the rapidly increasing competition in AI development, the head of AI research at Meta announced her departure from a high-profile position at the Instagram and Facebook company.

In her social media post, she wrote, “Today, as the world undergoes significant change, as the race for AI accelerates, and as Meta prepares for its next chapter, it is time to create space for others to pursue the work”.

Meta did not immediately respond to an emailed inquiry about Joelle Pineau’s decision to step down. Pineau herself has not yet announced who will take over her role.

Situated in Montreal, where Pineau also holds a professorship in computer science at McGill University, she was a key figure in Meta’s open-source AI strategy, notably with their Llama language model.

The announcement of Pineau’s departure comes before Meta’s inaugural LlamaCon AI conference on April 29th. Her leadership of Meta’s AI research began in 2023; this group, originally called Facebook AI Research, was founded ten years earlier by figures like the groundbreaking AI researcher Yann LeCun. Despite leaving his position as the group’s director in 2018, LeCun is still Meta’s chief AI scientist.

Source: https://www.business-standard.com/technology/tech-news/meta-s-ai-research-head-joelle-pineau-to-step-down-after-eight-years-125040200063_1.html