Meta expands its AI team as more individuals join, with the entire Play AI team now spearheading voice solution development using artificial intelligence.
In a significant move to establish a dominant AI ecosystem, Meta has announced the acquisition of Play AI, a startup specializing in AI-generated natural-sounding human voices and voice cloning tools, for a reported $15 billion. The deal, confirmed on Sunday, is part of Meta's aggressive investment strategy in AI and marks a significant step towards embedding conversational and voice AI technologies into its product portfolio.
Play AI, known for its ability to generate speech with "hyper-realism across any language, accent, and dialect," will integrate its core technology across several fronts, including Meta's AI Characters, Meta AI ecosystem, wearable devices like Ray-Ban smart glasses and Quest VR headsets, and audio content creation platforms on Facebook and other software services.
The entire Play AI team, including top researchers Trapit Bansal, Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov, Xiaohua Zhai, and Ruoming Pang (previously of Apple), will join Meta’s AI division, working under Johan Schalkwyk, a leading speech AI expert who recently joined from Sesame AI. This move is expected to bolster Meta’s conversational AI capabilities.
The acquisition is a strategic fit for Meta's roadmap in AI, as Play AI's work in creating natural voices and a platform for easy voice creation aligns with Meta's focus on AI Characters, Meta AI, wearables, and audio content creation. Meta has also recruited Daniel Gross, the CEO of Safe Superintelligence (SSI), following a failed acquisition attempt, and GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, who co-founded a venture capital firm (NFDG) with Gross.
Meta's strategic plan with the acquisition of Play AI and its prior investments in AI-related companies and technologies is centred on building a dominant AI ecosystem with advanced voice technologies and superintelligent AI capabilities. This includes a major reorganization of Meta’s AI business, appointing Alexandr Wang (CEO of Scale AI) to lead the new Meta Superintelligence Labs, and significant capital expenditures on AI infrastructure.
The acquisition of Play AI is part of a larger, aggressive investment strategy by Meta in AI, which also includes building a robust ecosystem of AI applications based on Meta’s technology platform to enhance user experiences across social media, AR/VR, wearable tech, and conversational AI tools. Meta has invested $3.5 billion into eyewear company EssilorLuxottica to further AI-powered wearable technology development and $14.3 million into Scale AI as part of a deal that gives Meta a 49% stake in the startup.
However, Meta has faced criticism for "poaching" high-level employees from other companies, offering as much as $100 million in bonuses. The company has also partnered with Groq to deliver Dialog, a market-leading voice AI model, and Reality Defender to combat AI voice deepfakes.
Investors in Play AI include 500 Startups, Kindred Ventures, Race Capital, 500 Global, and Soma Capital. Play AI allows anyone to clone various voice types for use in AI-driven applications like customer service. With this acquisition, Meta aims to capitalize on the growing importance of conversational and voice AI technologies, embedding them deeply into its product portfolio to maintain competitive advantage in AI-driven user interaction and immersive experiences. Their vision includes creating personalized AI characters and leveraging voice AI in new interfaces, wearables, and content creation, driving next-generation social and interactive platforms powered by AI.
The acquisition of Play AI, a startup specializing in AI-generated natural-sounding human voices and voice cloning tools, by Meta will enhance Meta's conversational AI capabilities, particularly in the areas of AI Characters, the Meta AI ecosystem, and audio content creation. The entire Play AI team, including top AI researchers, will integrate their core technology into Meta's product portfolio, ranging from Ray-Ban smart glasses to Facebook's audio content creation platforms, further reinforcing Meta's strategic investment in artificial-intelligence technology.
