
Facebook Launches Research Lab, Hires Google Executive to Helm It - batguano
http://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-launches-research-lab-hires-google-executive-to-helm-it-1460580859
======
tedmiston
I opened the tab --> paywall.

I opened the tab in incognito --> paywall.

I clicked through from Google News
([https://www.google.com/search?q=google+news+facebook+reserac...](https://www.google.com/search?q=google+news+facebook+reserach+lab&oq=google+news+facebook+reserach+lab&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i64.6071j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#tbm=nws&q=facebook+research+lab))
--> suddenly no paywall with a top banner "You are reading a preview of a paid
article" (but it's the whole thing).

I clicked through from Google News a second time in a new tab --> paywall
again.

¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

Here are some free sources:

 _Ex-Darpa Head Regina Dugan Leaves Google for Facebook_
[http://www.wired.com/2016/04/regina-dugan-leaves-google-
for-...](http://www.wired.com/2016/04/regina-dugan-leaves-google-for-
facebook/)

 _Regina Dugan exits Google to lead Facebook’s Building 8, a new R &D lab_
[http://techcrunch.com/2016/04/13/regina-dugan-exits-
google-t...](http://techcrunch.com/2016/04/13/regina-dugan-exits-google-to-
lead-facebooks-building-8-a-new-rd-lab/)

 _Facebook hires Google 'moonshot' exec for R&D_
[http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2016/04/13/facebook-...](http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2016/04/13/facebook-
hires-google-moonshot-exec-rd/82989856/)

~~~
basch
i select the title text on hackernews, right click, "Search google for" and
click the top link. wsj copy w/o paywall.

i dont even bother to click wsj links directly anymore. it's just habit to
right click and search google instead.

~~~
mcintyre1994
FYI, the Web link by the title does exactly this for you.

~~~
basch
yea i always forget about that, because my habit transcends hackernews

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kzhahou
I wish more stories about executive appointments were promotions instead of
just hiring existing execs. I have zero insight on the person referenced in
this article, but my professional experience has been full of execs who are
not really exceptional and yet will stay in those high-up roles for life,
while the lower ranks are full of talent waiting years for some small career
advancement.

~~~
spicyj
It's harder to make a news story out of "director promoted to VP" than it is
out for "Google VP leaves for Facebook". I think at all of these companies, a
large portion of the executive team was promoted from within and has been with
the company for many years.

~~~
spyspy
And that snubbed director is going to leave to be VP of another company and
the cycle starts all over again.

~~~
spicyj
My point was that promotions do happen frequently, you just don't hear about
most of them.

~~~
kzhahou
You're right that there's gonna be selection bias if one just judges by press.
But I've seen this internally many times as well.

------
yeukhon
Someone please just paste the article. I can't even locate a cache version now
on Google to bypass subscription. The closest is
[http://www.marketwatch.com/story/facebook-hires-google-
exec-...](http://www.marketwatch.com/story/facebook-hires-google-exec-to-lead-
new-research-lab-2016-04-13)

~~~
yurymik
Facebook Launches Research Lab, Hires Google Executive to Helm It Called
Building 8, the new group will build new hardware based on Facebook software

[[https://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/BN-
NN776_0413fa_J...](https://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/BN-
NN776_0413fa_J_20160413163343.jpg)] Facebook’s new Building 8 research lab
will complement the work conducted at the company’s Oculus virtual-reality
division. Above, attendees try out Gear VR glasses during the Facebook F8
Developers Conference in San Francisco. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG NEWS

By DEEPA SEETHARAMAN and JACK NICAS Updated April 13, 2016 7:01 p.m. ET 0
COMMENTS

Facebook Inc. created a research lab to develop hardware products and hired a
top Google executive to lead the effort, underlining the social-networking
company’s broadening technology ambitions.

The new group, called Building 8, will be led by Regina Dugan, a former
Pentagon research chief who joined ​ Alphabet Inc.’s Google in 2012. It will
create hardware products that “advance our mission of connecting the world,”
Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post Wednesday. Facebook
will invest “hundreds of people and hundreds of millions of dollars into this
effort over the next few years,” he said.

Building 8 will help launch a 10-year strategic plan outlined by Mr.
Zuckerberg at its annual F8 developer conference this week, including advances
in artificial intelligence, augmented and virtual reality, and extending
Internet access to billions of people around the world, Mike Schroepfer,
Facebook’s chief technology officer, said in an interview..

In a statement, Dr. Dugan said: “Building 8 is an opportunity to do what I
love most. tech infused with a sense of our humanity. Audacious science
delivered at scale in products that feel almost magic. A little badass. And
beautiful.”

Dr. Dugan received her Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the California
Institute of Technology and was the first woman to lead the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon research lab known as Darpa, which she
helmed from 2009 to 2012. Later, she joined Motorola, then a division of
Google, and helped launch Google’s Advanced Technology and Projects, a
research lab for ambitious new products.

“I’m excited to have Regina apply DARPA-style breakthrough development at the
intersection of science and products to our mission,” Mr. Zuckerberg said.
“This method is characterized by aggressive, fixed timelines, extensive use of
partnerships with universities, small and large businesses, and clear
objectives for shipping products at scale.”

Dr. Dugan’s team at Google is effectively the tech giant’s short-term skunk-
works lab, with two-year time limits on many of its projects. That differs
from X, an Alphabet unit that works on longer-term bets, such as self-driving
cars and delivery drones.

As of last year, Dr. Dugan’s lab at Google had about 100 staff and 1,000
nonemployee subject experts working on various projects, including sensor-
embedded clothing, modular smartphones and technology that enables mobile
devices to effectively “see” in three dimensions. That 3-D-sensing technology,
dubbed Project Tango, is being released in some smartphones this year.

Dr. Dugan is the latest high-level defection from Google to Facebook. Last
year, Facebook hired Mary Lou Jepsen, a high-profile executive from Google’s
advanced-projects lab, to work on Oculus. Her background is in display
technology.

Google on Wednesday thanked Dr. Dugan for her work and said it wished her “the
very best.”

At Building 8, which is named for the number of letters in Facebook, Dr. Dugan
will build new hardware products that mix the physical and digital worlds, the
company said. Mr. Schroepfer said Building 8 will help other Facebook teams on
longer-term projects, including its artificial-intelligence research lab and
its Oculus virtual-reality division, which recently started shipping its first
VR headset.

“It’s going to start small but it’s going to grow,” Mr. Schroepfer said. “We
are serious about this being a group that will ship products, not just do
research.”

Building 8 will develop products similar to the virtual-reality camera that
captures 360-degree video that Facebook unveiled this week, he said. Facebook
doesn’t plan to sell that camera. Instead, the company released the designs
publicly to encourage other companies and developers to build VR cameras and
thus make it easier for people to create VR content, which would be a boon to
Facebook’s vision for the technology.

“I think that’s a really good example of the sorts of projects we should be
doing a whole heck of a lot more,” he said. “There are things we need to do in
the world that you can only really do with hardware, and you’ve got to kind of
build them yourself—even if it’s just building the reference design for
others.”

Write to Deepa Seetharaman at Deepa.Seetharaman@wsj.com and Jack Nicas at
jack.nicas@wsj.com

~~~
trhway
anybody remembers that country club - Sun Labs - when they lost their own
building and took over the first floor of MPK16. This new FB Labs with non-
existent building kind of reminded...

This professional executive FB got sounds similar to Marissa - stellar looking
record (which Google was happy to part with :) while i couldn't find any real
substance. A lot of smooth talks, speeches, articles, etc. about how to do
disruptive innovation though. "Advanced Technology and Projects group, a
skunkworks-inspired team chartered to deliver breakthrough innovations for the
company"
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regina_E._Dugan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regina_E._Dugan))
in Motorolla and Google ... so what real results are, what "breakthroughs"
have been delivered (is it the "electronic tattoo that can be used to
authenticate a user instead of a password")? I mean, of course, i'm just out
of curiosity as it is FB's money, so who cares.

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JeffTl
This is depressing for two reasons.

1\. Google's top level management is boring af. Regina Dugan imho has Steve
Jobs level charisma. To see her leave, her in particular, just feels very
disappointing.

2\. And joining Facebook?!! She might as well have gone and setup a research
lab for the Porn industry.

Nothing makes sense anymore :(

~~~
petra
<< Google's top level management is boring af.

Why ? She had a pretty decent role at Google.

~~~
thesimpsons1022
I think he's saying the people are boring.

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mkoble11
phenomenal hire - regina dugan is fantastic! looking forward to what's next

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Animats
Hardware products. Hmm. They already have Oculus. What next in social
hardware? "Sensor-embedded clothing". Injectable RFID tags?

 _Do not attempt to remove the loyalty bracelet._

~~~
wslh
Streaming your daily emotions and convert them in reactions.

~~~
manlike_chive
more like converting them into ad buys

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daedalusschemer
Sad they call these things 'Research Labs.' RD&E != Research Labs, it just
sounds good in the news media.

