Meta

Meta, formerly known as Facebook, is a technology company at the forefront of artificial intelligence (AI) development and application. The company's core business revolves around its social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger, which collectively serve billions of users worldwide. Meta's AI capabilities are deeply integrated into these platforms, powering features such as content recommendations, ad targeting, and image recognition. The company's DeepText system understands text across multiple languages with near-human accuracy, while its DeepFace AI system handles image identification with 97% accuracy as of 2014.

In July 2024, Meta released Llama 3.1, an open-source AI model with 405 billion parameters, which the company claims outperforms some proprietary models from competitors. Meta AI, the company's AI assistant, is available across its platforms and on meta.ai, offering features like question-answering, image generation, and task assistance. Meta's AI initiatives extend beyond its current products to the development of the metaverse, a virtual world concept that the company sees as the future of social and economic interaction.

Meta's AI efforts have significantly impacted its advertising business, which accounts for 98% of its revenue. In Q2 2024, Meta reported a 22% year-over-year increase in revenue to USD 39.07 billion, outpacing competitors in the digital advertising market. The company attributes this growth to AI-driven improvements in ad performance and content recommendations. However, Meta's AI endeavors have also faced criticism, particularly regarding content moderation and the spread of misinformation on its platforms.

Key customers and partnerships

Meta's platforms serve a diverse global user base, with billions of monthly active users across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. Meta AI was available in 22 countries, including the US, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. The company has partnerships with major tech firms to support the deployment of its AI models. In April 2024, Meta announced collaborations with Google and Microsoft to provide search results through its AI assistant, integrating their search engines into Meta AI's capabilities. Additionally, Meta works with over two dozen companies, including Amazon, Nvidia, and Databricks, to help developers deploy their own versions of Meta's AI models.