Elon Musk founded X.AI, an artificial intelligence startup that has filed with the SEC to raise up to $1 billion through an initial public offering (IPO).
The company has already secured nearly $135 million from four investors, with the first sale occurring on Nov. 29. X.AI has a “binding and enforceable agreement” for the purchase of the remaining shares, according to the filing. Musk announced X.AI in July, describing its mission as seeking to “understand the true nature of the universe.” Inspired by “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” the startup recently unveiled Grok, a chatbot with a witty, rebellious personality and real-time internet knowledge.
X.AI aims to compete with companies like OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic in the chatbot space. Musk, who controls X.AI, reportedly secured high-powered graphics processing units (GPUs) from Nvidia earlier this year to build a large language model. X.AI is one of several companies led by Musk, including Tesla, SpaceX, Twitter, the Boring Company, and Neuralink. Last month, Musk stated that investors in X (formerly Twitter) would own 25% of X.AI. The company operates separately from X Corp but collaborates closely with other Musk-led ventures. X.AI’s team includes individuals with experience at DeepMind, OpenAI, Google Research, Microsoft Research, Twitter, and Tesla, having worked on projects like DeepMind’s AlphaCode and OpenAI’s GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 chatbots.
Musk incorporated X.AI in Nevada in March. On a Tesla earnings call in July, Musk explained that he launched X.AI as a startup to attract top AI talent who were more willing to join a startup than a large established company like Tesla. The filing for X.AI’s financing coincided with Musk’s appearance at the 2023 DealBook Summit, where he responded to advertisers who had suspended campaigns on X by telling them to “go f*** yourself.” Numerous advertisers had stopped spending on X after Musk posted and amplified antisemitic comments.