Meta admits its AI agents stalled for four months
Mark Zuckerberg's admission at a July town hall came minutes before Meta's AI chief claimed an unreleased model, Watermelon, already matches GPT-5.5.
EBElena Brandt
Published 6 Jul 2026, 23:34Updated 21 Jul 2026, 09:161 min read
At Meta's July 2 town hall, Mark Zuckerberg told employees that the company's AI agent efforts had stalled for roughly four months — an unusually candid admission from leadership of a company racing to keep pace with OpenAI, Anthropic and Google.
An awkward juxtaposition
Minutes after Zuckerberg's comments, Meta's AI chief reportedly claimed that an unreleased internal model, code-named Watermelon, already matches GPT-5.5 on internal benchmarks — a claim that has not been independently verified.
- ▸Zuckerberg acknowledged a four-month stall in agent development
- ▸Watermelon remains unreleased, with performance claims unverified externally
- ▸The comments highlight internal pressure as competitors ship rapidly
Source: AI News Today
