Yann LeCun, the pioneering AI researcher widely regarded as one of the "godfathers of modern AI" alongside Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio, has officially confirmed his departure from Meta after a 12-year tenure, announcing plans to launch his own startup focused on advanced machine intelligence. In a LinkedIn post on November 19, 2025, the 65-year-old Turing Award winner—recipient in 2018 for his foundational work on convolutional neural networks—stated, "As many of you have heard through rumours or recent media articles, I am planning to leave Meta after 12 years: 5 years as founding director of FAIR and 7 years as Chief AI Scientist." LeCun joined Facebook (now Meta) in 2013 to establish the Fundamental AI Research (FAIR) lab, where he championed long-term, curiosity-driven AI exploration, amassing over 1.5 million followers on X and influencing global debates on ethical AI development.

The move, first rumoured in early November via reports from the Financial Times and TechCrunch, stems from strategic divergences at Meta under CEO Mark Zuckerberg's aggressive pivot toward commercial AI products and "superintelligence" initiatives. In October 2025, Meta restructured its AI divisions, creating the "Superintelligence Labs" led by 28-year-old Alexandr Wang—former CEO of Scale AI, acquired in a $14.5 billion deal—shifting LeCun's reporting line from Chief Product Officer Chris Cox to the younger executive. This came amid layoffs of 600 FAIR employees, fuelling perceptions that the lab's emphasis on fundamental research was being sidelined for rapid deployment of large language models (LLMs) like Llama 4, which underperformed against rivals from OpenAI and Google. LeCun, a vocal sceptic of LLMs' path to true intelligence, has long argued they lack essential capabilities like causal reasoning and physical world understanding, often clashing publicly with figures like Elon Musk on AI's existential risks.

LeCun's new venture will build on his "Advanced Machine Intelligence" (AMI) program, pursued at FAIR, NYU—where he serves as a Silver Professor—and collaborations worldwide, aiming to develop AI systems that "understand the physical world, have persistent memory, can reason, and can plan complex action sequences." Dubbed "world models" in industry parlance, these architectures would simulate cause-and-effect scenarios using video and spatial data, enabling more animal-like planning and potentially revolutionising robotics, autonomous systems, and healthcare—areas LeCun has championed since his 1980s innovations in computer vision. Meta plans to partner with the startup, granting access to its innovations while allowing LeCun independence, a model reminiscent of DeepMind's early ties to Google. He expressed gratitude to Zuckerberg, CTO Andrew Bosworth, Cox, and former CTO Mike Schroepfer for fostering FAIR's growth into a 600-person powerhouse.

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LeCun's exit underscores broader tensions in Big Tech's AI arms race, where foundational research often yields to product timelines amid a $100 billion+ annual investment surge. At Meta, this follows other departures like VP Joelle Pineau to Cohere, highlighting a talent exodus as Zuckerberg recruits aggressively—yet LeCun's move signals confidence in his vision's viability outside corporate constraints. On X, reactions poured in swiftly, with users like @CuriousCatsAI quipping, "Yann LeCun is leaving Meta to build an AI startup because this ship is sinking faster than my college GPA—who's up for some world modelling?" while @HashedTech noted, "Marking the end of a pioneering research era at the company." Euronews hailed him as the "French 'AI godfather,’" amplifying global buzz around his potential to disrupt the field.

As LeCun transitions—expected by year-end—he remains an NYU professor, poised to attract top talent and funding in a venture landscape flush with AI capital. His startup could accelerate "world models" research, already pursued by labs like Google DeepMind and World Labs, potentially bridging AI's current text-heavy limitations toward more embodied intelligence. This chapter closes a defining era at Meta while opening one for independent AI innovation, with LeCun's legacy as a bridge between academia and industry enduring.

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