Zuckerberg says Meta bet billions on AI without knowing it would work

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed on a podcast that last year, the company committed hundreds of billions of dollars to build AI infrastructure without knowing if its AI products would succeed. He told Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang the investment could be 100 or 200 billion dollars, with no guarantee it would pay off.

Meta CFO Susan Li repeatedly warned them that failure would come at a huge cost. To compete with US tech companies like Alphabet, OpenAI and Anthropic, Meta now ranks among the top spenders on AI data centers.

Investors remain worried about the surge in AI spending. Meta's free cash flow fell to multi-year lows last quarter, and its stock dropped 8%. The company will report earnings on October 21. Its stock is up more than 12% this year.