Meta funds skilled trades jobs program for AI data center buildout

Meta is investing $115 million to stand up a new training program for data center technician jobs, as the social media giant races to build the infrastructure to power its AI ambitions.

The cost-free program, America's Workforce Academy, will end in guaranteed job offers to graduates, the company said in a statement.

A Meta spokesperson said the program will provide generalist ‌training for ⁠data center ⁠technicians. Jobs on offer will be full-time roles with general contractors working on Meta's data center buildout, ​she added.


The spokesperson declined to specify how many positions would be available, with which firms and ​whether they would be union jobs.

The Associated Builders and Contractors, a construction trade group, said it expects to train thousands of people over the course of the program.

"The ​AI revolution is bringing change but also historic opportunities," said ⁠Dina Powell ‌McCormick, Meta president and vice-chairman.

The investment is a tiny slice ​of the $600 billion ​total Meta has pledged to invest in U.S. infrastructure and ⁠jobs over the next three years, as it builds out ​massive data centers to power CEO Mark Zuckerberg's aggressive bets on ​AI agent technologies.

Zuckerberg has said his goal is to build AI assistants that can take action autonomously on their users' behalf to create apps, book appointments and complete transactions.

He embarked on a big-ticket hiring spree last year to enable that vision for "personal superintelligence," offering $100 million signing bonuses to AI researchers from rival firms like OpenAI.

More recently, ‌he has been carrying out an AI-related restructuring inside Meta, laying off 10% of the workforce, or about 8,000 employees, and reassigning nearly ​as many others ​to new units aimed ⁠at improving the company's AI models and tools.

In general, data centers tend to produce short-term construction booms and a small number of permanent jobs.

For instance, a data center in ​Texas where Meta broke ground last year - one of the largest planned in the U.S. - is projected to have more than 1,800 workers onsite at peak construction but to create about 100 jobs once operational.

Another Meta data center in Oklahoma is expected to create more than 1,000 construction jobs at its peak and about 100 operational jobs upon completion.