Meta, which has been struggling to keep up with its competitors in the AI race and recently lost its chief AI scientist, is removing another key executive. The company’s chief revenue officer is apparently leaving for greener pastures.
Bloomberg reports that John Hageman, who has been with the company for more than 17 years, will step down from his role as CRO to start his own company. According to the Wall Street Journal, Hageman, who has been in the position for less than a year, previously held several key roles at the company, including working on Facebook apps and on the company’s advertising team. Bloomberg says Hageman will be immediately replaced by Andrew Bocking, another longtime employee of Meta.
“After 17 remarkable years at Meta, I’ve decided it’s time to close this chapter and start building my own company — something I’ve wanted to do for some time,” Hegeman said in a post on an internal Meta message board, which was seen by the Journal. “Working here has been an incredible privilege, with many memories to cherish and a long list of personal thanks that I owe to many of you.”
The Chief Revenue Officer is tasked with overseeing the entire revenue operations of a company and has a wide range of responsibilities. CROs have become more and more common in recent years and are considered a core part of the corporate hierarchy. It’s unclear what Hageman’s new company will look like, as the executive has not yet shared any details publicly.
Several other long-serving executives have also left the company in recent weeks. In fact, Meta also recently lost its chief AI scientist, Yann LeCun, who is also leaving to start his own company. LeCun, who has been with the company for nearly a decade, recently poured cold water on the idea that AI could lead to “human-level” intelligence, and the tech industry’s interest in LLM suggests it may be headed in the wrong direction. Bloomberg notes that the company also recently lost the leader of its business AI unit, and that the company’s CISO (top cybersecurity person), Guy Rosen, is also being given a new AI-related role.
Gizmodo contacted Meta for more information about Hageman’s recent departure.
The recent role changes do not indicate anything particularly serious for the meta. The company is growing rapidly — although its third-quarter earnings missed some ground, and investors are reportedly uneasy about the tech giant’s plan to inject huge amounts of cash into building out its AI business. “Meta Superintelligence Labs is off to a great start, and we look forward to continuing to lead the industry in AI glasses,” Mark Zuckerberg said last month when the company announced its third-quarter earnings. The skepticism about Meta’s AI investments is equivalent to what other tech giants are experiencing right now – as investors are becoming wary of huge spending that is, more and more, feeling like a bubble waiting to burst.