Some displaced employees expressed frustration online. “We were helping build the future, then we got replaced by it,” one engineer wrote on Meta’s internal forum. Another lamented, “We were told we’d be the architects of the future. Turns out, we’re just collateral damage.”
Alexandr Wang Defends the Cuts
Wang defended the layoffs as a painful but necessary step toward a leaner, more efficient AI organization. “The AI teams had become fragmented,” he said in a company memo, calling for a more “load-bearing” structure focused on breakthroughs rather than bureaucracy.
Critics, however, question the decision to dismiss experienced AI specialists—the very people who built the systems that power Meta’s products. “It’s not cost-cutting,” said one insider. “It’s deciding who gets to build the future—and spoiler: it’s not the people we just fired.”
Infrastructure Over Innovation?
Adding to the controversy, Meta announced a $27 billion data center project in Louisiana just one day before the layoffs. CEO Mark Zuckerberg described the move as a “focus realignment,” but many in the industry saw it as a shift from research and community-driven development toward hardware dominance.
