The key facts

  • Santosh Janardhan, Meta's head of infrastructure since 2009, will leave in 2027 and move into an advisory role at Meta Compute
  • He will be succeeded by Dave Brown, who joined Meta this year after 19 years at Amazon
  • The reasons for the departure were not named; Bloomberg, citing an internal memo, was the first to report the departure

Meta is changing the head of its infrastructure

Meta has confirmed that its long-time head of infrastructure and co-head of engineering, Santosh Janardhan, is leaving the company. Bloomberg was the first to report the departure, citing a recently circulated internal memo, and then TechCrunch published details based on a statement from the company. According to Meta, Janardhan will remain with the company during the transition period and will move into an advisory role at Meta Compute; he is expected to leave next year.

Who will take over

His successor will be Dave Brown, who joined Meta this year as vice president of infrastructure. Previously Brown spent 19 years at Amazon, where he worked on computing, cloud, and AI, according to his LinkedIn profile. For Meta, which is actively ramping up infrastructure investments to compete in the AI race, bringing in a leader with many years of cloud experience at Amazon looks like a logical continuation of the company's strategy.

Reasons and context

The reasons for the departure are not being disclosed: according to media reports, the memo did not state the grounds for leaving, and Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment. CNBC, citing the memo, noted that Janardhan apparently referred to the need to 'pass the baton'. Janardhan joined the company in 2009 and took part in its transformation into one of the largest internet companies. In recent years Meta's infrastructure investments have grown sharply amid the AI race, and earlier this year Janardhan was tasked with leading Meta Compute — an initiative to scale up data center investments and the related strategy.