The AI talent war in Silicon Valley: Tech giants are spending heavily to recruit

As competition in the field of artificial intelligence intensifies, American tech giants are sparing no expense to attract talent. According to statistics from the technology recruitment company Harrison Clarke, salaries across the entire AI field have been continuously rising. The total compensation for mid-to-senior research scientists in large technology groups is currently expected to be between $500,000 and $2 million, up from $400,000 to $900,000 in 2022. In contrast, the basic annual salary of senior software engineers without AI experience usually hovers between 180,000 and 220,000 US dollars. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has recently been on a large recruitment drive, even offering a $100 million signing bonus to researchers from OpenAI and Google DeepMind in exchange for their job changes. This news quickly sparked widespread discussions in the industry.

The AI talent war in Silicon Valley has brought about multi-dimensional and profound impacts on the technology sector, covering multiple aspects. The first is the impact on the landscape of the technology industry. eta poached at least eight core researchers from OpenAI within just a few weeks through means such as a $100 million signing bonus and a $14.3 billion acquisition of Scale AI, including the three founders of the Zurich office and the core developers of the inference model. This move directly impacted the continuity of the OpenAI project, forcing the latter to urgently adjust its compensation system, offering a retention bonus of 2 million US dollars and over 20 million US dollars in equity incentives. The success or failure of an AI laboratory highly depends on a few "individual contributors" (ics), and their mobility may change the competitive landscape of the technological route. For instance, Meta's newly established "Super Intelligence Lab" (MSL), after integrating top talents, is accelerating its catch-up with Google and OpenAI's leading position in the field of general artificial intelligence (AGI). The annual salary of top AI engineers has exceeded 10 million US dollars, a 50% increase compared to 2022. The annual salary package of some researchers has surpassed 10 million US dollars. Google DeepMind offers top researchers a $20 million annual salary plus non-cyclical equity incentives, while Meta enhances its appeal by shortening the stock exercise period. Small and medium-sized companies are facing recruitment difficulties. The start-up Hugging Face was forced to turn to Europe to look for lower-cost talents. Internal conflicts have intensified, and companies like Microsoft are discussing offering more equity to employees who have been transferred internally to quell dissatisfaction.

The second is the impact on technology. Zuckerberg integrated the AI business into the "Super Intelligence Lab" (MSL), aiming to develop AI systems that exceed human capabilities and raised 29 billion US dollars to expand the data center. However, globally, there are only a few dozen to a thousand "individual contributors" (ics) who can drive the leap of large language models, and their work can determine the success or failure of AI laboratories. Its Llama 4 model performed poorly due to insufficient technical accumulation, exposing the risk of disconnection between heavy investment and actual results. OpenAI has consolidated its advantages in the inference field through models such as o1-mini and o3-mini, but its high-intensity work pace (employees working 80 hours per week) has led to morale fluctuations, and the all-staff leave plan reflects the management pressure on the team. The differentiation of technical routes is intensifying: Meta pursues "god-level technology", while OpenAI focuses on productization and implementation. Execution ability will become the key variable determining success or failure.

Thirdly, it has an impact on tech talents. 65% of the top AI companies in the United States were founded by immigrants, but in recent years, visa restrictions have become stricter, leading Chinese scholars to return or turn to Europe and Singapore. French President Emmanuel Macron publicly recruited global scientific researchers. Japan provided high subsidies for Indian students studying abroad. Singapore's NAIS 2.0 strategic plan expanded the number of AI practitioners to 15,000. This talent flow is reshaping the global AI innovation landscape. To alleviate the shortage of talents, enterprises must start exploring internal training programs.

To sum up, the AI talent war in Silicon Valley, as a key variable in the technology field, is using talent mobility as a lever to drive profound changes in the industry landscape. In the future, only by balancing strategic investment with sustainable innovation can we reshape the technological landscape while creating real value for human society.