Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, is set to invest up to $65 billion this year to enhance its artificial intelligence (AI) initiatives, as CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed on Friday. In a Facebook post, Zuckerberg proclaimed that 2025 "will be a defining year for AI. " He anticipates that "Meta AI will become the leading assistant for over 1 billion users, Llama 4 will emerge as the top state-of-the-art model, and we will develop an AI engineer capable of significantly contributing to our R&D efforts. " Zuckerberg noted that Meta is constructing a vast data center to support these projects, planning to invest between $60 billion and $65 billion in 2025, while stressing, "We have the capital to keep investing in the coming years. " This latest strategy from Meta aims to strengthen its competitive edge against rivals like OpenAI and Google in the race for AI dominance. In a related development, tensions have flared between Elon Musk and tech leader Sam Altman over a shared AI infrastructure project. In light of the success of OpenAI's ChatGPT, major tech companies have been pouring tens of billions into developing AI infrastructure. Meta's announcement follows President Donald Trump's recent revelation that OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle will collaborate to create a venture called Stargate, allocating $500 billion toward AI infrastructure in the U. S. Earlier this month, Microsoft disclosed plans for an approximate $80 billion investment in data centers for fiscal 2025, while Amazon has indicated that its spending in 2025 would exceed an estimated $75 billion in 2024. Meta has positioned itself as a key contender in the AI sector with its AI chatbot, Ray-Ban smart glasses, and an open-source model that distinguishes it from rivals by allowing consumers and many businesses to utilize its Llama AI models at no cost. The projected capital expenditure of $60 billion to $65 billion for 2025 marks a notable increase from the company's anticipated spending of $38 billion to $40 billion last year.

This investment also surpasses analysts' projections of $50. 25 billion for 2025, according to LSEG data.