Facebook Transfers PyTorch AI Framework to Linux Foundation for Governance

The Linux Foundation will now oversee the PyTorch AI framework from a project governance level.

In a Facebook post, meta (formerly Facebook) founder Mark Zuckerberg announced that the popular and widely used PyTorch framework would be governed by The Linux Foundation. While Linux Foundation will oversee the project, it will still be led by scientists and researchers from Meta.

PyTorch is an open-source machine learning and artificial intelligence framework used by millions today, including some famous deep-learning engines. Tesla’s Autopilot, Uber Pyro, and Catalyst are some of the well-known commercial applications of this framework.

Developed by Meta AI, PyTorch provides a computation engine for deep neural networks and Tensor computing for GPUs. It primarily uses Python as the programming language and also supports C++.

From the announcement, it is clear that a new board will be formed under The Linux Foundation, and members will come from the community, including Google, Amazon, Nvidia, AMD and Microsoft.

Since it is now under The Linux Foundation, the project might get additional funding from the community, which is probably not possible while under Meta.

Although this move by Meta is a surprise but looks like it is a calculative one. Due to the ongoing post-pandemic Global recession, all the major product companies are facing pressure in terms of margins and other business metrics. Recently, almost all the MAANG companies have frozen hiring.

Meta might be looking for cost-cutting by passing over the governance and operations of this project to the Linux Foundation.

That being said, the open-source community will benefit from this move in the coming days since it will be more community-driven, and collaboration will be much easier.

More details are in the Facebook AI blog.

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