Meta is building a 3D AI clone of Mark Zuckerberg so employees feel more connected to the CEO: Report

Meta is developing a photorealistic, artificial intelligence-powered 3D version of its chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, to engage with employees in his place, according to a report by the Financial Times. The initiative is said to be a part of the company’s multibillion-dollar strategic pivot to remake the technology group around generative AI.

Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg AI:

Reportedly, Meta has been working on photorealistic, AI-powered 3D characters that users can interact with in real time, and the company recently began prioritising a Zuckerberg AI character.

The AI character is being trained on Zuckerberg’s mannerisms, voice, tone, publicly available statements, and his recent thinking regarding company strategy. The Meta CEO is said to be personally involved in the training and testing of the animated AI, which can offer conversation and feedback to employees, allowing them to feel more connected to the founder.

The project is said to be at an early stage and is separate from the previously reported “CEO agent,” which is being built specifically to assist Zuckerberg with his own operational tasks, such as rapid information retrieval.

Technology behind Meta’s Zuckerberg agent:

Meta’s Superintelligence Labs has reportedly been focusing heavily on creating photorealistic embodiments of virtual AI characters. However, scaling the effort has proven technically difficult since the technology requires large amounts of computing power to achieve realism, while eliminating interaction lag requires massive amounts of computing power.

The social media behemoth has also been focusing on improving voice interactions with the characters, and it also acquired two voice-focused companies, PlayAI and WaveForms, last year.

The Zuckerberg AI character is being trained on images of the Meta CEO along with his voice. Reportedly, if the experiment is successful, the company plans to eventually offer the underlying technology to influencers and creators so they can build high-fidelity AI versions of themselves.

Notably, Meta had earlier rolled out its ‘AI Studio’ that allowed creators to build AI versions of themselves to chat with their fans.

Growing use of AI at Meta:

Meta has reportedly been pushing employees to use AI internally for streamlining processes and becoming more efficient. The FT report notes that employees are being encouraged to use agentic tools from OpenClaw to design their own AI agents and automate tasks. Created by Peter Steinberger, the AI agent platform had gone viral earlier this year and later led to its creator being recruited by OpenAI.

Moreover, product managers have also been invited to complete a new AI-focused “skills baseline exercise” that includes technical system design testing and “vibe coding”. The exercise has reportedly sparked internal fears of impending job cuts among some employees, but Meta maintains that the test is not mandatory and is strictly designed to identify where product managers require additional training and development.

Even Zuckerberg has reportedly become increasingly hands-on with Meta’s technical execution. He is said to be spending five to 10 hours a week actively coding on various AI projects and sitting in on technical reviews.