Meta is transferring some of its top software engineers into a newly created artificial intelligence engineering division as part of a broader internal restructuring that comes ahead of expected large-scale layoffs, according to an internal memo seen by Reuters.
The social media giant has begun informing selected employees this week that they will be moved into the new Applied AI (AAI) Engineering organization. The division was established last month and is being led by Maher Saba, a vice president in Meta’s Reality Labs unit and a longtime associate of Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth.
When the new unit was first announced, Saba invited engineers across the company to volunteer to join the initiative. However, a follow-up memo revealed that the process is no longer optional.
“The company is now moving to the next phase: scaling the team,” Saba wrote, adding that Meta had worked with internal leadership to identify strong software engineering talent to join the group.
“AAI is one of the company’s highest priorities and we’re resourcing it by moving our strongest talent to address it. Therefore, the transfers aren’t optional,” he said.
A spokesperson for Meta declined to comment on the memo or provide further details about the new team.
The restructuring comes as Meta prepares sweeping layoffs that could affect tens of thousands of employees as the company seeks to manage the high costs of building artificial intelligence infrastructure and adapt its workforce to a more AI-driven future.
The Applied AI Engineering organization will focus on building tools and evaluation systems designed to accelerate the development of AI agents capable of performing complex tasks autonomously, including writing software code.
According to Saba, the long-term goal is for these AI agents to carry out most of the work involved in building, testing and deploying Meta’s products and infrastructure, with human employees overseeing the systems rather than performing the majority of the work themselves.
Meta has already pushed employees to increase their use of AI tools this year and has begun restructuring some teams within its Reality Labs division to operate as “AI-native” units. These teams rely more heavily on AI-generated reports and analytics, with fewer managers overseeing larger groups of employees.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg signaled this shift earlier in the year during a call with investors, saying he expects artificial intelligence to dramatically reshape how work is done inside the company.
“We’re investing in AI-native tooling so individuals at Meta can get more done, we’re elevating individual contributors, and flattening teams,” Zuckerberg said.
He added that if the transformation succeeds, Meta could significantly increase productivity while making work more efficient across the organization.