Meta's Muse Shops Well, but It Is Not Yet Profitable
Shopping use is strong so far, but reporters say investors are watching whether efficiency gains can bring computing costs down.
WSJ What's News · Can Meta Turn Muse’s Popularity Into Profits?Meta's shopping assistant Muse is not yet profitable, even as early shopping activity has been strong.
Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said, "The most common use case for Muse is shopping." He said more than a fourth of Muse users had used it to shop, with purchases averaging above $200.
The hurdle is what happens behind each request. Muse relies on AI agents, software that can browse websites and take actions for shoppers. That work requires lots and lots of computer processing, known as compute, running on powerful machines in data centers. That processing "costs the company lots of money," said Meghan Bobrowsky, who covers Meta from San Francisco.
Meta chief financial officer Susan Lee told investors on a recent call that Muse is not yet a profitable business and that making it profitable will take time.
The reporting noted that getting there will require technological efficiencies, or doing the same shopping work with far less computing power. Bobrowsky said, "we're not yet at a point where I think you can say this is a total home run for Meta and they're out of the woods here."
Bobrowsky asked how Meta could make the agent more efficient enough "to where it's actually profitable," or whether this is "another bet that's costing them more than it's ultimately bringing them in?"
Questions people ask
What exactly is compute, and why does it cost so much?
Compute is time on specialized computer chips in large data centers. Companies either buy the chips and pay for electricity and cooling, or rent access from cloud providers, and heavy AI tasks can require many chips working at once.
Why does a shopping agent need more compute than a chatbot?
Unlike a simple search that returns one answer, an agent may load pages, compare options, fill forms, and retry when something fails. Each of those steps requires more AI work, so one shopping request can mean many expensive calculations.
How would Meta eventually make money from Muse?
The plan is to take a cut of online sales completed through Muse, potentially from both shoppers and merchants. Analysts have estimated that could eventually add billions of dollars in revenue, but only at large scale and with low operating costs.