Meta Platforms’ aggressive push to hire top artificial-intelligence talent is running into resistance despite record compensation packages. The Wall Street Journal reported that Andrew Tulloch, a former OpenAI engineer and co-founder of Mira Murati’s 50-person startup Thinking Labs, turned down a recruitment offer from Mark Zuckerberg that could have paid him as much as $1–1.5 billion over four to six years. Tulloch’s decision highlights the limits of Meta’s cash-heavy strategy. The company has approached roughly 100 OpenAI employees in recent months but persuaded only about 10 to jump ship, according to the same report. One candidate on Meta’s super-intelligence team was reportedly offered more than $200 million, underscoring how pay packages for star researchers have reached levels once reserved for chief executives. Rivals are responding by stressing mission and pay equity rather than matching Meta’s checks. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said in a podcast interview that his company would not negotiate nine-figure deals, calling Meta’s overtures a “unifying moment” that strengthened employee loyalty. The standoff illustrates the escalating—and increasingly expensive—battle for expertise as Big Tech and well-funded startups race to build next-generation AI systems.