Elon Musk speaks onstage throughout The New York Occasions Dealbook Summit 2023 at Jazz at Lincoln Middle on November 29, 2023 in New York Metropolis.
Slaven Vlasic | Getty Pictures
X.AI, a synthetic intelligence startup based by Elon Musk, has filed with the SEC to boost as much as $1 billion in an fairness providing.
The corporate has already introduced in practically $135 million from 4 buyers, with the primary sale occurring on Nov. 29, and has a “binding and enforceable settlement” for the acquisition of the remaining shares, the submitting says.
The AI startup, which Musk introduced in July, seeks to “perceive the true nature of the universe,” in keeping with its web site. Final month, X.AI launched a chatbot known as Grok, which the corporate says is modeled after “The Hitchhiker’s Information to the Galaxy.” The chatbot debuted with two months of coaching and has real-time information of the web, the corporate claims.
“Grok is designed to reply questions with a little bit of wit and has a rebellious streak, so please do not use it should you hate humor!” X.AI wrote on its web site, including, “It is going to additionally reply spicy questions which are rejected by most different AI methods.”
The corporate did not instantly reply to a request for remark.
With Grok, X.AI goals to instantly compete with firms together with ChatGPT creator OpenAI, which Musk helped begin earlier than a battle with co-founder Sam Altman led him to depart the undertaking in 2018. It is going to even be vying with Google’s Bard know-how and Anthropic’s Claude chatbot.
Earlier this 12 months, Musk reportedly secured hundreds of high-powered graphics processing items (GPUs) from Nvidia, the sort of chips essential to construct a big language mannequin.
X.AI is one among many firms owned or led by Musk. Along with his management of X, beforehand Twitter, which he bought final 12 months, Musk is CEO of Tesla and SpaceX. He additionally operates underground tunnel developer Boring Firm and brain-tech startup Neuralink.
Final month, Musk mentioned buyers in X (previously Twitter) would personal 25% of X.AI.
“We’re a separate firm from X Corp, however will work carefully with X (Twitter), Tesla, and different firms to make progress in the direction of our mission,” X.AI says on its web site.
Individuals engaged on X.AI embody alumni of DeepMind, OpenAI, Google Analysis, Microsoft Analysis, Twitter and Tesla. They’ve labored on tasks together with DeepMind’s AlphaCode and OpenAI’s GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 chatbots, in keeping with LinkedIn profiles.
Musk included X.AI in Nevada in March, in keeping with filings.
On a Tesla earnings name in July, this is what Musk advised analysts questioning about whether or not X.AI could compete with any of Tesla’s enterprise:
“There have been simply a number of the world’s finest AI engineers and scientists that had been prepared to hitch a startup however they weren’t prepared to hitch a big, kind of comparatively established firm like Tesla,” he mentioned. “So I used to be like, OK properly, higher it is a startup that I run than they go work elsewhere. That is sort of the genesis of X.AI.”
For X.AI’s financing, the date of the preliminary sale coincided with Musk’s look on the 2023 DealBook Summit, the place he advised advertisers who had suspended campaigns on X to “go f*** your self.” Dozens of advertisers had stopped spending on X after Musk posted and amplified antisemitic feedback.
— CNBC’s Lora Kolodny contributed to this report
WATCH: Elon Musk’s X.AI launches ‘Grok’
