Ruoming Pang, the lead engineer and manager of Apple's Foundation Models team, is leaving the company for Meta, according to a Bloomberg report citing people familiar with the matter.
Pang oversaw the development of Apple's large language models, which power features like Genmoji, email summaries, and priority notifications on Apple devices.
Pang joined Apple from Alphabet in 2021. His next stop is Meta's new Superintelligence unit, which focuses on advanced AI systems. To lure Pang away, Meta reportedly offered a compensation package worth tens of millions of dollars per year.
Apple's foundation models under pressure
Pang's exit is the most significant leadership change in Apple's AI division since the launch of the Apple Intelligence initiative. He led a team of about 100 engineers, which, for the first time in June, was set to open its models to outside developers.
Internally, Apple's Foundation Models team is facing increasing pressure. Company leadership is considering using external models from OpenAI or Anthropic for a new version of Siri, a move that has dampened morale. According to Bloomberg, several team members are already planning to leave for Meta or other companies. Pang's close colleague Tom Gunter left Apple last month.
Pang isn't the only hire Meta has made from the AI world in recent weeks. The company has also brought on several high-profile AI experts, including Alexandr Wang from Scale AI, Daniel Gross, Nat Friedman, Yuanzhi Li from OpenAI, and Anton Bakhtin from Anthropic. Bloomberg reports that Meta hired several OpenAI researchers as early as last month.
With Pang's departure, Zhifeng Chen is taking over the AFM team. The previous flat structure, where many engineers reported directly to Pang, will be replaced by a multi-layered organization with several managers.
