Broadcom’s Tan Hock Eng joins the Meta board

Tan Hock Eng. — Reuters

PETALING JAYA: Facebook parent Meta has announced the election of two new members to its board of directors, including Penang-born Tan Hock Eng, who has also been the president and chief executive officer (CEO) of semiconductor company Broadcom since 2006.

Tan previously held senior management positions with PepsiCo and General Motors, acted as the vice-president of finance with Commodore International, managing director of Pacven Investment, and board chairman of Integrated Device Technology.

In a statement from Meta, Tan said that he is “pleased to join the Meta board and contribute to achieving the company’s vision”. Meta has an incredible role to play in the next-generation of computing as it evolves its platform and apps offerings for the future.

“I look forward to working with Mark Zuckerberg, the broader team and the other board members on Meta’s technology and business journey.”

Also joining the Meta board of directors alongside Tan is John Arnold, co-founder of philanthropic fund Arnold Ventures, with a background in the energy industry.

Meta CEO Zuckerberg wrote in a post to his Facebook page that the addition of the new board members will assist the company in achieving its long-term objectives.

“As we focus on building artificial general intelligence or AGI, having directors with deep expertise in silicon and energy infrastructure will help us execute our long-term vision.

“Tan is CEO of Broadcom, which he has built into one of the leading semiconductor companies in the world. I got to know him as he informally advised me and the Meta team on our year of efficiency.

“Arnold is founder of Arnold Ventures. He brings deep expertise in finance and energy, which will be critical as we build out the large-scale infrastructure to train and deploy future artificial intelligence (AI) models,” he wrote.

This comes after news that Meta would be deploying custom in-house chips as part of its AI push.