Meta Infrastructure Chief to Step Down in 2027
Santosh Janardhan will leave his role running Meta's infrastructure team in early 2027, with Dave Brown, formerly of Amazon Web Services, set to take over.
Updated on Nov. 11, 2026 in Data Centers
Meta's head of infrastructure and co-head of engineering, Santosh Janardhan, will step down from running the infrastructure team in early 2027, according to an internal memo reported by Bloomberg. The memo gave no reason for the departure.
Why it matters
The change puts a new leader in charge of infrastructure at a time when Meta is planning heavy spending on computing power for AI. The handover will also shape how the company secures the capacity its AI ambitions require.
Meta expects capital spending of up to $145 billion in 2026 and holds about $825 billion in future commitments, mostly for data centres and cloud computing, according to figures reported alongside the change. The reasons for the departure have not been disclosed.
The players
Meta
Meta is the technology company that owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, and is spending heavily on data centres and computing capacity for artificial intelligence.
Santosh Janardhan
Santosh Janardhan is Meta's head of infrastructure and co-head of engineering, who joined Facebook in 2009 and is now stepping down from running the infrastructure team.
Dave Brown
Dave Brown is an executive who oversaw computing and machine learning services at Amazon Web Services for nearly two decades before joining Meta in 2026.
The details
Janardhan, who joined Facebook in 2009, became co-lead of Meta Compute in January 2026, a group planning how the company secures computing power for AI. He will remain through the first quarter of 2027 to help with the handover, and will then advise as chief technology officer of Meta Compute.
Timeline
January 2026: Janardhan becomes co-lead of Meta Compute.
2026: Dave Brown joins Meta after nearly two decades at Amazon Web Services.
Q1 2027: Janardhan remains with the company to assist with the handover.
Early 2027: Janardhan steps down from running the infrastructure team.
The Tech Race
Meta is bringing in Dave Brown, who oversaw computing and machine learning services at Amazon Web Services for nearly two decades, as it races rival cloud providers to build AI computing capacity. The leadership change comes as Meta is in talks to lease $10 billion of computing capacity to Anthropic.
The leadership change is unlikely to affect everyday users directly in the short term, since the handover runs through early 2027. Its effects will show up in how quickly Meta can add the computing capacity needed for its AI products and services.
The takeaway
Leadership changes at major infrastructure companies can signal shifts in how firms plan and pay for the computing power behind AI. Readers following the sector should watch how Meta's new infrastructure leadership handles its large data centre commitments.
What happens next
Janardhan remains with Meta through the first quarter of 2027 to assist with the handover before stepping down from running the infrastructure team in early 2027.
Further reading
For more on the infrastructure behind these AI plans, see Data Centers.
