Qinghua Wang

** Big update on the roadmap for Meta's MTIA roadmap (our Meta-designed AI chips) ** We just shared today a big update on the MTIA (Meta Training & Inference Accelerator) roadmap. The main takeaway is we're accelerating the whole set of programs to get rapid iterations on chips (given how fast the model needs are evolving). 👉 Overall blog is here: https://lnkd.in/gaHuxUfg For the networking aficionados, you can see a whole lot of networking that we've been working on inside MTIA - we're excited to finally be able talk about it! 👉 The scale-up and scale-out networks we've already talked about. It's sort of buried in there, but we are already running distributed training clusters with MTIA 300 for core ranking & recommendation (even as we focus future generations on Inference). 👉 The communication library (HCCL) that is purpose-built to take advantage of networking-specific capabilities we've built into the chips to offload the main compute. 👉 The in-built support for fused compute/communication kernels to minimize latency (key for both training and inference workloads). Super-proud of the whole MTIA team!

143

4 Comments

🧠 While LLMs continue to grab the spotlight, Small Language Models (SLMs) are quietly reshaping how we think about efficiency in AI. I recently explored how SLMs can run entirely on CPUs, unlocking new possibilities for low-cost, privacy-friendly, and scalable inference, ideal for teams experimenting with AI or deploying it at the edge. In my latest piece for Towards AI publication, I cover: 💡 Why CPUs are back in the AI conversation: smarter models, quantization, and optimized runtimes like llama.cpp ⚙️ SLMs vs LLMs: how a hybrid strategy can balance capability and cost 🧩 CPU Inference Tech Stack: GGUF, Ollama, and other tools making CPU inference practical 🧠 Hands-on section: building a translation app using llama.cpp, Streamlit, and AWS EC2, fully CPU-based The best part? You can try it locally - no GPU required. It’s been exciting to see the response so far, the article has already crossed 200+ likes on Medium! 📖 Read my full blog post here: 👉 https://lnkd.in/gby-EBmJ #SLM #llamacpp #cpu #BeginnerFriendly #AWS

7

Among other things, my team has been focusing on AI research for agents. We just blogged about a recent project: the Test-Time Diffusion Deep Researcher (TTD-DR). This framework uses a Deep Research agent to draft and revise its own drafts using high-quality retrieved information. This approach achieves new state-of-the-art results in writing long-form research reports and completing complex reasoning tasks. The work achieves better results than any other deep research agent we compared to. It also shows that self-evaluation and self-improvement are must-have components of a successful agent. https://lnkd.in/gBZpVMQy

297

8 Comments

Well-defined customer problems are built on data-based insights. Insights are gleaned from swimming in data and metrics. This includes customer usage metrics, process or operations metrics, user interviews, demographic data, customer feedback, customer support data and anecdotes. The more data-based and specific your insight, the more accurate and helpful your problem paragraph will be. This is why the process can take months. However, distilling these quantified insights into a single paragraph gives you the best chance at building a truly useful product

5

We're hiring three AI Analytics Engineers on the Data Science & Analytics team at Airtable. These are early to mid-career roles for builders who are excited about working at the intersection of data science, analytics, and AI. One of these roles will report directly to me as we spin up a new AI & Analytics Platform function. Things are moving fast. The most impactful work in data right now isn't building models — it's fundamentally changing how a company gets answers from its data. That's where my focus is, and it's why Airtable is investing in a new team to own it. Over the past six months, our team stopped experimenting with AI on the side and restructured around it: - Agent-powered development workflows — I built shared AI systems for the data team embedded in how we write SQL, build pipelines, document business logic, and debug. Team members are regularly seeing 2x to 10x speed improvements — not from shortcuts, but from AI woven into every step of how we build. - Conversational analytics — Ad-hoc questions that used to fill our queue from leadership, product, GTM, and finance are increasingly answered by an AI agent — in natural language, where people already work. -A context layer that makes it trustworthy — We built a system that gives the agent real business knowledge — which table is correct for a given analysis, how metrics differ across teams, why something spiked last quarter. Context that usually lives in an analyst's head. - A learning loop that compounds — Every user correction becomes a permanent improvement, not a one-off fix. — We're doubling down. Airtable is standing up an AI & Analytics Platform function within DS&A to keep building at the intersection of data science, ML, analytics, and AI — and I'm leading it. We need more builders. AI Analytics Engineer, AI & Analytics Platform First hire on this team. You'll build the context layer that makes AI tools accurate, design evaluation frameworks that make them trustworthy, and develop agent systems that let the org self-serve with confidence. You'll work directly with me to shape what this function becomes. https://lnkd.in/gFstQqQb We're also hiring two roles embedded in other parts of the business: AI Analytics Engineer, Marketing Analytics Own data infrastructure, dashboards, and AI-native tooling for Marketing. Build the canonical data sources leadership relies on. https://lnkd.in/gYHS55ma AI Analytics Engineer, Business Analytics Own financial data models powering ACV, ARR, billings, and revenue. Partner with a Finance team that's building their own AI agents and workflows. You'll build the data foundation they run on. https://lnkd.in/gV5hnJjG — I'm looking for people who build before they're asked. Who have a side project that started as "I wonder if I could..." and turned into something real. Who pick up a new tool and immediately try to break it. If that sounds like you — reach out or apply. I'd love to talk.

79

8 Comments

Third piece in the AAD series is up. This one is about acceptance criteria (AC) and why treating them as a formal contract changes what you can diagnose when autonomous development breaks.  AC serve as the bridge between the spec and the environment in which the spec is compiled into a product. This is implicit in the first article, but after marinating on this for a few weeks, I felt like I should make it explicit.                                                                                                    The short version: most teams write AC the way you'd write them for a human. "Handle edge cases gracefully." "Performance should be acceptable under normal load." In AAD, those are  specification failures. An agent will do something when it reads that. It might even do something reasonable. But you've handed control over what "reasonable" looks like to the LLM, and you'll only find out whether you agree after you've burned the iteration cycle. In my experience, the first pass is ok, but it can quickly diverge and it takes a lot of time to get back to where you intended to go in the first place. One thing I keep coming back to is the diagnostic value of keeping the spec and the AC separate. My currently line of thinking leads me to this framing: The spec describes intent. The AC defines done. You need both. The Spec is the what and the why. The AC are the falsifiable tests that the intention was met. Keeping them separate creates a framework so they each get the attention they deserve as part of this new world. Building on the notion of falsifiability, there's also a section on the right mindset for writing AC. Just like with the best scientist/experimentalist, you should be writing AC from a lens that lets you confirm intention was not met, not that intention was met. It's a subtle but meaningful nuance. If you assume the agent is going to get it correct, you're biased to see the final product and assume it's correct. When you train yourself to focus on the ways the agent might get it wrong, you open up a whole new world on writing great AC. I think this applies to traditional development as well as AAD. Claude made a fancy doc for this one! But also, the full read is in the comments.

15

1 Comment