Elon Musk's xAI Secures $6 Billion in Series C Funding, Accelerating AI Supercomputer Development

Elon Musk's xAI raises $6B to build more powerful AI supercomputers

Elon Musk's xAI has raised $6 billion in its latest funding round, pushing its total capital raised to $12 billion at a valuation of $50 billion, reports TechCrunch. The round, which involved 97 investors, followed a doubling of xAI's valuation within six months and solidified the company's position as a growing competitor in the AI sector. Major investors in this funding round include Nvidia, AMD, Andreessen Horowitz, Blackrock, Fidelity, Kingdom Holdings, and Sequoia Capital, among others. Only previous investors who backed Musk's earlier ventures, such as the Twitter acquisition, could participate. The minimum investment per participant was $77,593, but the identities of most investors remain undisclosed. The company plans to raise additional funds next year to sustain its growth as it seeks to challenge larger rivals in the generative AI market. xAI has already built the Colossus supercomputer, which is powered by 100,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs. In the coming months, it is expected to expand to 200,000 Nvidia GPUs, and eventually, Elon Musk hopes to build a supercomputer with one million GPUs. For reference, $6 billion is roughly enough to procure a supercomputer with servers containing 100,000 Nvidia GPUs at $30,000 per processor. Typically, GPUs account for around half of the cost of a supercomputer cluster. With more powerful supercomputers, xAI will be able to train more sophisticated large language models to gain an edge over OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Gemini. Musk has positioned xAI to compete directly with industry leaders like OpenAI. He has accused OpenAI and its partner Microsoft of engaging in anti-competitive practices that hinder funding for alternative companies. Also, Musk claims that xAI benefits from data drawn from X. At the same time, X's recent privacy policy change allows xAI to train its models using user-generated content on the X platform. Beyond X, xAI leverages data from other Musk enterprises like Tesla and SpaceX to enhance its AI models. xAI has rapidly advanced its technology with its flagship AI model, Grok, which powers several tools on X, including a chatbot accessible to X Premium users and image generator Flux. Unlike politically correct OpenAI, Grok can answer provocative questions while maintaining some boundaries on sensitive topics. Grok currently supports customer service for SpaceX's Starlink internet service, and xAI is exploring potential collaborations with Tesla for R&D purposes. However, some Tesla shareholders have expressed concerns, accusing Musk of reallocating resources from Tesla to xAI and viewing the two companies as competitors. xAI generates approximately $100 million annually, significantly trailing competitors like Anthropic and OpenAI, which are targeting billions in revenue. They also received significantly more funding: Anthropic and OpenAI have secured billions in funding. The report claims that AI venture capital activity reached $31 billion in Q3 2024, and as xAI accelerates its development, it aims to carve out a larger share of this booming market.

Elon Musk's xAI raises $6 billion from Nvidia, AMD, and others

Serving tech enthusiasts for over 25 years. TechSpot means tech analysis and advice you can trust. What just happened? Elon Musk-led AI startup xAI has raised $6 billion in Series C funding, valuing the company at around $40 billion, up from $24 billion earlier this year. Some of the notable investors who participated in this round include semiconductor giants Nvidia and AMD, as well as major VCs and asset management firms, such as BlackRock, Fidelity, Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, and more. In total, 97 investors were involved in this round of funding, with the minimum investment per participant pegged at $77,593. Investors were only allowed to participate if they had helped Musk raise funds for his Twitter acquisition in 2022. xAI is reportedly planning to raise additional funds next year as it strives to compete with Google and OpenAI, which have opened up a substantial lead in the high-stakes generative AI game. Since closing its Series B funding round in May 2024, xAI has built a high-power supercomputer called 'Colossus' and released its Grok-2 frontier language model with state-of-the-art reasoning capabilities. Colossus is expected to make it easier for xAI to build and test its AI models, including the aforementioned Grok LLMs that power a chatbot for X Premium users and the Flux image generator. Believed to be the world's largest supercomputer, Colossus is powered by 100,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs, each costing upwards of $30,000. xAI plans to use some of the new funds to double the size of Colossus to 200,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs. Musk is an important player in the AI sector, having helped found OpenAI in 2015. However, he left the project in 2018 following disagreements with other co-founders, including Sam Altman, who is currently the company's CEO. Musk has also often sounded the alarm against AI, claiming it could destroy humanity without sufficient guardrails. As part of his continuing battle against OpenAI and its founders, Musk sued the company earlier this year, alleging "deceit of Shakespearean proportions." According to his lawsuit, Altman and another co-founder, Greg Brockman, violated the founding contract that envisioned OpenAI as a non-profit organization dedicated to public good. Altman, however, rejected all charges, saying Musk was the one who originally wanted to establish OpenAI as a for-profit company. According to him, the founding members agreed in 2017 to convert OpenAI into a for-profit venture, but rejected Musk's demand for majority equity and the post of the company's CEO. He also alleged that the SpaceX and Tesla CEO is now trying to thwart OpenAI's progress to help his own fledgling AI startup.

Musk's xAI Raises $6 Billion in Series C Funding

Musk aims to develop AGI grounded in rigorous truth-seeking and devoid of ideological bias. xAI has completed a $6 billion Series C funding round, attracting investments from prominent firms such as Andreessen Horowitz (a16Z), BlackRock, Sequoia Capital, NVIDIA and AMD, among others. According to their blog, the funding will help the company's efforts to expand its infrastructure and accelerate AI research. "Really proud of the team for all the crazy things we executed in lightning time! Here's to greater heights in 2025!" xAI co-founder Greg Yang posted on X. In reference to the recent funding, xAI CEO Elon Musk took to X to share that "a lot of compute is needed". Notably, Musk co-founded OpenAI alongside Sam Altman. In 2023, he departed to compete with established AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic. Earlier this year, OpenAI secured $6.6 billion in funding from investors, including Thrive Capital, NVIDIA, Microsoft, and SoftBank Group. "$12B raised this year since Grok-1 was launched a year ago. We're building AI end-to-end; we're building our own supercomputer and our own human data team. Grok-3 will be the most powerful engine," said Mat Roy, project lead at xAI. Musk aims to develop Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) while prioritising rigorous truth-seeking systems without ideological biases. The upcoming frontier model Grok 3 is envisioned as a major advancement, aiming to outperform existing AI models. xAI has introduced Colossus, the world's largest AI supercomputer. It is powered by 1 lakh NVIDIA Hopper GPUs and will be operational within 122 days, with plans to expand to 2 lakh GPUs. xAI is currently training its next flagship model, Grok 3, which is likely to be released next year. Since its Series B announcement in May, xAI has introduced several key initiatives, including Grok 2, an advanced language model; Aurora, an image generation tool; and the xAI API, which provides developers with low-latency access to AI models globally. The integration of Grok with the X platform enhances real-time data analysis with features like web search and image generation.

xAI Raises USD 6 Billion in Series C Funding Round

xAI's mission to develop advanced, beneficial AI systems for humanity. xAI, the artificial intelligence (AI) firm co-founded by Elon Musk, has raised USD 6 billion in its Series C funding round, with participation from key investors including A16Z, Blackrock, Fidelity Management and Research Company, Kingdom Holdings, Lightspeed, MGX, Morgan Stanley, OIA, QIA, Sequoia Capital, Valor Equity Partners and Vy Capital, among others, the company said in a blog post on December 24. Strategic investors Nvidia and AMD also participated in the round. Also Read: xAI Secures USD 6 Billion in New Funding to Enhance AI Capabilities With the new funding, the company aims to accelerate its infrastructure and the development of new AI products, including the deployment of its flagship Grok language model and Colossus supercomputer. This funding will also accelerate product offerings for both enterprise and consumer markets, particularly with recent launches like Grok 2 and Aurora, an AI-driven image generation model. Since its Series B in May 2024, xAI said it has made significant technical progress in AI technology, including the launch of Colossus, the world's largest AI supercomputer, powered by 100,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs. The system was operational in 122 days, with plans to double its GPU count. Also Read: Perplexity Acquires Carbon, Expands Publisher Program with 15 New Media Partners "Soon, xAI will double the size of Colossus to a combined total of 200,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs, achieved by using the Nvidia Spectrum-X Ethernet networking platform," the company said. Additionally, the company introduced Grok 2, an advanced language model with state-of-the-art reasoning capabilities, and the xAI API, offering developers programmatic access to foundation models. xAI's Aurora image generation model enhances multimodal capabilities, while Grok on X integrates real-time world insights into the platform. Also Read: OpenAI Raises USD 6.6 Billion to Accelerate AI Research and Expansion "xAI's most powerful model yet, Grok 3, is currently training and we are now focused on launching innovative new consumer and enterprise products that will leverage the power of Grok, Colossus, and X to transform the way we live, work, and play," the company said in the blogpost. "The funds from this financing round will be used to further accelerate our advanced infrastructure, ship groundbreaking products that will be used by billions of people, and accelerate the research and development of future technologies enabling the company's mission to understand the true nature of the universe," the company added. xAI says it is primarily focused on developing advanced AI systems that are truthful, competent, and maximally beneficial for all of humanity.

Elon Musk's xAI Raises $6 Billion in New Funding

Sign up for the On Tech newsletter. Get our best tech reporting from the week. Get it sent to your inbox. The artificial intelligence company founded by Elon Musk, xAI, said on Monday that it had raised $6 billion, giving the start-up a major lift as it competes with rivals, including OpenAI. The company said on its website that it would use the money to continue building its infrastructure and accelerate research and development. BlackRock, Fidelity, Sequoia Capital and others participated in the funding round. "A lot of compute is needed," Mr. Musk said of the investment round in a post on X. The fund-raising could value xAI at $35 billion to $40 billion, up from $24 billion earlier this year, The New York Times previously reported. Mr. Musk and xAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Mr. Musk is trying to play catch up on A.I. The billionaire, who also leads other companies, including Tesla, X and SpaceX, publicly debuted xAI last year, well after a boom in the A.I. industry spawned dozens of products that could create text, images and even videos. Mr. Musk quickly built what he said would be the world's largest supercomputer in Memphis, which powers Grok, xAI's chatbot. Grok is available to subscribers on X. Mr. Musk helped found OpenAI, but walked away from it in 2018 after disagreements with other co-founders, including Sam Altman, its chief executive. Mr. Musk has sued OpenAI to block it from transforming itself from a nonprofit into a for-profit company, saying that Mr. Altman and another co-founder, Greg Brockman, had breached the company's founding contract by putting commercial interests before the public good. OpenAI has argued that the lawsuit is an attempt to hamstring the company while Mr. Musk builds a rival. (The New York Times has sued OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement of news content related to A.I. systems. OpenAI and Microsoft have denied those claims.) Mr. Musk has argued that A.I. could destroy humanity, but that he has the ability to build it more safely. To jump-start xAI, Mr. Musk has trained its A.I. on data from X. Several investors in Mr. Musk's bid to acquire X in 2022 have also provided funding for the A.I. start-up, including the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and the Saudi Arabian Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal's investment company, Kingdom Holding. X has raised more than $12 billion in total.

Elon Musk's xAI Secures $6 Billion In Series C Funding To Expand Colossus Supercomputer, Attracts Investments From Nvidia And BlackRock

Enter your email to get Benzinga's ultimate morning update: The PreMarket Activity Newsletter Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI announced on Monday it has secured $6 billion in Series C funding from major technology and financial institutions, marking its second major funding round this year. What Happened: The investment includes strategic participation from NVIDIA Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., alongside financial giants BlackRock, Inc. and Morgan Stanley. The funding will support xAI's ambitious expansion of its Colossus supercomputer, which currently operates with 100,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs. The company plans to double this capacity to 200,000 GPUs using Nvidia's Spectrum-X Ethernet networking platform. Since its founding in July 2023, xAI has rapidly grown to a reported valuation of $50 billion, positioning itself as a significant competitor to OpenAI, which is valued at $157 billion. The company's growth has outpaced other AI startups including Anthropic ($19 billion valuation) and Perplexity ($2.8 billion valuation). See Also: Tesla Shorts, Gordon Johnson, And James Chanos Express Skepticism On Robotaxi Potential Amid Usage Data Debate: The 'Promise' Worth Much More Than Reality Why It Matters: The funding announcement coincides with xAI's expansion of its chatbot Grok's availability. Previously exclusive to paying subscribers of X, formerly known as Twitter, Grok is now being tested as a standalone iOS app and will be accessible through Grok.com. The chatbot features real-time web access and generative AI capabilities, including text rewriting and image generation. Additional investors in the round include Andreessen Horowitz, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Kingdom Holdings, Lightspeed, Sequoia Capital, and several sovereign wealth funds. According to an SEC filing, the minimum investment in this round was $77,593, with nearly 97 investors participating. The funds will support xAI's continued development of advanced AI systems, including Grok 3, which is currently in training. Read Next: Sam Altman-Backed Nuclear Power Startup Oklo Receives Outperform Rating From Wedbush Amid 'AI Revolution' Buzz Image Via Shutterstock Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs

Elon Musk's xAI lands $6B in new cash to fuel AI ambitions | TechCrunch

xAI, Elon Musk's AI company, has raised $6 billion, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday. Investors gave a minimum of $77,593, per the filing (97 participated, but the document doesn't reveal their identities). xAI later announced (confirming some earlier reporting) that Andreessen Horowitz , Blackrock, Fidelity, Kingdom Holdings, Lightspeed, MGX, Morgan Stanley, OIA, QIA, Sequoia Capital, Valor Equity Partners, Vy Capital, Nvidia, AMD, and others numbered among them. The new cash brings xAI's total raised to $12 billion, adding to the $6 billion tranche xAI raised this spring. CNBC reported in November that xAI was aiming for a $50 billion valuation -- double its valuation as of six months ago. According to the Financial Times, only investors who'd backed xAI in its previous fundraising round were permitted to participate in this one. Reportedly, investors who helped finance Musk's Twitter acquisition were given access to up to 25% of xAI's shares. Musk formed xAI last year. Soon after, the company released Grok, a flagship generative AI model that now powers a number of features on X, including a chatbot accessible to X Premium subscribers and free users in some regions. Grok has what Musk has described as "a rebellious streak" -- a willingness to answer "spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems." Told to be vulgar, for example, Grok will happily oblige, spewing profanities and colorful language you won't hear from ChatGPT. Musk has derided ChatGPT and other AI systems for being too "woke" and "politically correct," despite Grok's own unwillingness to cross certain boundaries and hedge on political subjects. He's also referred to Grok as "maximally truth-seeking" and less biased than competing models, although there's evidence to suggest that Grok leans to the left. Over the past year, Grok has become increasingly ingrained in X, the social network formerly known as Twitter. At launch, Grok was only available to X users -- and developers skilled enough to get the "open source" edition up and running. Thanks to an integration with the open image generator Flux, Grok can generate images on X (without guardrails, controversially). The model can analyze images as well, and summarize news and trending events (imperfectly, mind). Reports indicate that Grok may handle even more X functions in the future, from enhancing X's search capabilities and account bios to helping with post analytics and reply settings. xAI is sprinting to catch up to formidable competitors like OpenAI and Anthropic in the generative AI race. The company launched an API in October, allowing customers to build Grok into third-party apps, platforms, and services. According to The Wall Street Journal, xAI is preparing to release a standalone consumer app similar to OpenAI's in December. Musk asserts that it hasn't been a fair fight. In a lawsuit filed against OpenAI and Microsoft, OpenAI's close collaborator, attorneys for Musk accuse OpenAI of "actively trying to eliminate competitors" like xAI by "extracting promises from investors not to fund them." OpenAI, Musk's counsel says, also unfairly benefits from Microsoft's infrastructure and expertise in what the attorneys describe as a "de facto merger." Yet Musk often says that X's data gives xAI a leg up compared to rivals. Last month, X changed its privacy policy to allow third parties, including xAI, to train models on X posts. Musk, it's worth noting, was one of the original founders of OpenAI, and left the company in 2018 after disagreements over its direction. He's argued in previous suits that OpenAI profited from his early involvement yet reneged on its nonprofit pledge to make the fruits of its AI research available to all. xAI has outlined a vision according to which its models would be trained on data from Musk's various companies, including Tesla and SpaceX, and its models could then improve technology across those companies. It is already powering customer support features for SpaceX's Starlink internet service, according to The Wall Street Journal, and the startup is said to be in talks with Tesla to provide R&D in exchange for some of the carmaker's revenue. Tesla shareholders, for one, object to these plans. Several have sued Musk over his decision to start xAI, arguing that Musk has diverted both talent and resources from Tesla to what's essentially a competing venture. Nevertheless, the deals -- and xAI's developer and consumer-facing products -- have driven xAI's revenue to around $100 million a year. For comparison, Anthropic is reportedly on pace to generate $1 billion in revenue this year, and OpenAI is targeting $4 billion by the end of 2024. Musk said this summer that xAI is training the next generation of Grok models at its Memphis data center, which was apparently built in just 122 days and is currently powered partly by portable diesel generators. The company hopes to upgrade the server farm, which contains 100,000 Nvidia GPUs, next year. (Because of their ability to perform many calculations in parallel, GPUs are the favored chips for training and running models.) In November, xAI won approval from the regional power authority in Memphis for 150MW of additional power -- enough to power roughly 100,000 homes. To win the agency over, xAI pledged to improve the quality of the city's drinking water and provide the Memphis grid with discounted Tesla-manufactured batteries. But some residents criticized the move, arguing it would strain the grid and worsen the area's air quality. Tesla is also expected to use the upgraded data center to improve its autonomous driving technologies. xAI has expanded quite rapidly from an operations standpoint in the year since its founding, growing from just a dozen employees in March 2023 to over 100 today. In October, the startup moved into OpenAI's old corporate offices in San Francisco's Mission neighborhood. xAI has reportedly told investors it plans to raise more money next year. It won't be the only AI lab raising immense cash. Anthropic recently secured $4 billion from Amazon, bringing its total raised to $13.7 billion, while OpenAI raised $6.6 billion in October to grow its war chest to $17.9 billion. Megadeals like OpenAI's and Anthropic's drove AI venture capital activity to $31.1 billion across over 2,000 deals in Q3 2024, per PitchBook data.

Elon Musk xAI Secures $6B To Boost Generative AI Expansion: Details

xAI operates a Memphis data center with 100,000 Nvidia GPUs, set to double capacity in 2025 with upgraded infrastructure. Elon Musk xAI has raised $6 billion in its latest funding round, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. This round adds to the $6 billion raised earlier this year, bringing the company's total funding to $12 billion. The capital injection positions xAI to expand its generative AI initiatives and enhance its competitive edge. According to a recent report, Elon Musk xAI has successfully secured $6 billion from investors, including Andreessen Horowitz, BlackRock, Fidelity, Nvidia, and others. This latest funding round exclusively involved previous investors, many of whom had supported Musk's acquisition of X (formerly Twitter). The funds bring xAI total capital raised to $12 billion. The company plans to use this funding to accelerate the development of its generative AI model, Grok, and expand its ecosystem. This substantial financial backing positions the firm to compete with industry leaders such as OpenAI and Anthropic. Moreover, the Grok AI model, developed by xAI, powers a range of features on X, including a chatbot available to premium and free users in select regions. Known for its functionality, Grok can generate images through the Flux generator, analyze visuals, and summarize trending news. In October, xAI launched an API allowing developers to integrate Grok into third-party apps and platforms. The company also introduced a standalone iOS app for testing, further extending its generative Artificial Intelligence capabilities. To support its ambitious goals, Elon Musk xAI operates a Memphis data center equipped with 100,000 Nvidia GPUs. The facility, constructed in just 122 days, currently relies partly on diesel generators. According to the blog post, the company has plans to double the center's capacity in 2025, securing approval for additional power. The upgraded infrastructure will also benefit Tesla, with plans to integrate xAI's developments into autonomous driving technologies. This expansion reflects Elon Musk's vision to enhance AI applications across industries. While Elon Musk's xAI has made rapid advancements, it continues to face fierce competition. Rivals such as Anthropic and OpenAI have also secured billions in funding. Following the growing competition, earlier this month, the Tesla CEO filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, accusing them of anti-competitive practices. The lawsuit alleges that OpenAI coerced investors to avoid supporting rivals like Musk's xAI. Musk's legal team claims that Microsoft's $13 billion investment in OpenAI led to conflicts of interest and market manipulation In addition, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg emphasized the need for stricter oversight to prevent nonprofit entities from exploiting their status for financial gain. Joining Elon Musk, Zuckerberg called for a formal investigation into OpenAI's transition, highlighting potential misuse of tax-exempt donations and resources.

Elon Musk's xAI raises $6B to bolster battle against OpenAI: 'Gonna...

Elon Musk's artificial intelligence startup xAI revealed that it raised $6 billion in its latest funding round as the startup continues to ramp up in its battle against bitter rival OpenAI. Musk took a victory lap after announcing Monday on his social media platform X that the company concluded its Series C funding round -- which is usually the final stage of venture capital financing. "We are gonna need a bigger compute!" Musk wrote, in an apparent reference to the famous line from "Jaws." The need for a "bigger compute" is likely an indication that Musk plans to use the investment to build larger processing centers to warehouse super computers that will be needed to train and run more sophisticated AI models. The company had raised $6 billion in a Series B funding round in May at a post-money valuation of $24 billion. In late November, xAI raised another $5 billion at a $50 billion valuation, according to the Wall Street Journal. Now, it appears xAI raised a bigger round of $6 billion, but Musk didn't disclose the valuation. Investors in the latest funding round included Sequoia Capital, Morgan Stanley, BlackRock, Fidelity, Saudi Arabia's Kingdom Holdings, the sovereign wealth funds of Oman and Qatar, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Valor Equity Partners, Dubai-based Vy Capital and UAE-based MGX, the company said. In its latest announcement, xAI said that it is training Grok 3, the latest version of its chatbot, which was originally scheduled to be available by the end of this year. The infusion of cash comes as Musk is engaged in an AI arms race against ChatGPT maker OpenAI, the company he co-founded and which is now run by Sam Altman. Musk, who left OpenAI after losing a power struggle against Altman and other co-founders, is suing the company and its key financial backer Microsoft. He is alleging that Microsoft and OpenAI, which as of October was valued at around $157 billion, illegally sought to monopolize the market for generative artificial intelligence and sideline competitors.

Elon Musk's xAI lands $6B in new cash to fuel AI ambitions

xAI, Elon Musk's AI company, has raised $6 billion in a Series C financing round. The company announced this week that Andreessen Horowitz , Blackrock, Fidelity, Lightspeed, MGX, Morgan Stanley, OIA, QIA, Sequoia Capital, Valor Equity Partners, Vy Capital, Nvidia, AMD, and others participated. Kingdom Holdings, the Saudi conglomerate holding company, invested roughly $400 million in the round, according to a public filing. The filing also revealed that xAI is now valued at $45 billion, close to double its previous valuation. The new cash brings xAI's total raised to $12 billion, adding to the $6 billion tranche xAI raised in May. According to the Financial Times, only investors who'd backed xAI in its previous fundraising round were permitted to participate in this one. Reportedly, investors who helped finance Musk's Twitter acquisition were given access to up to 25% of xAI's shares. "xAI's most powerful model yet ... is currently training and we are now focused on launching innovative new consumer and enterprise products," xAI said in a statement. "The funds from this financing round will be used to further accelerate our advanced infrastructure, ship groundbreaking products ... and accelerate ... research and development." Grok has what Musk has described as "a rebellious streak" -- a willingness to answer "spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems." Told to be vulgar, for example, Grok will happily oblige, spewing profanities and colorful language you won't hear from ChatGPT. Musk has derided ChatGPT and other AI systems for being too "woke" and "politically correct," despite Grok's own unwillingness to cross certain boundaries and hedge on political subjects. He's also referred to Grok as "maximally truth-seeking" and less biased than competing models, although there's evidence to suggest that Grok leans to the left. Over the past year, Grok has become increasingly ingrained in X, the social network formerly known as Twitter. At launch, Grok was only available to X users -- and developers skilled enough to get the "open source" edition up and running. Thanks to an integration with the open image generator Flux, Grok can generate images on X (without guardrails, controversially). The model can analyze images as well, and summarize news and trending events (imperfectly, mind). Reports indicate that Grok may handle even more X functions in the future, from enhancing X's search capabilities and account bios to helping with post analytics and reply settings. xAI is sprinting to catch up to formidable competitors like OpenAI and Anthropic in the generative AI race. The company launched an API in October, allowing customers to build Grok into third-party apps, platforms, and services. And it just launched a standalone Grok iOS app to a test audience. Musk asserts that it hasn't been a fair fight. In a lawsuit filed against OpenAI and Microsoft, OpenAI's close collaborator, attorneys for Musk accuse OpenAI of "actively trying to eliminate competitors" like xAI by "extracting promises from investors not to fund them." OpenAI, Musk's counsel says, also unfairly benefits from Microsoft's infrastructure and expertise in what the attorneys describe as a "de facto merger." Yet Musk often says that X's data gives xAI a leg up compared to rivals. Last month, X changed its privacy policy to allow third parties, including xAI, to train models on X posts. Musk, it's worth noting, was one of the original founders of OpenAI, and left the company in 2018 after disagreements over its direction. He's argued in previous suits that OpenAI profited from his early involvement yet reneged on its nonprofit pledge to make the fruits of its AI research available to all. xAI has outlined a vision according to which its models would be trained on data from Musk's various companies, including Tesla and SpaceX, and its models could then improve technology across those companies. It is already powering customer support features for SpaceX's Starlink internet service, according to The Wall Street Journal, and the startup is said to be in talks with Tesla to provide R&D in exchange for some of the carmaker's revenue. Tesla shareholders, for one, object to these plans. Several have sued Musk over his decision to start xAI, arguing that Musk has diverted both talent and resources from Tesla to what's essentially a competing venture. Nevertheless, the deals -- and xAI's developer and consumer-facing products -- have driven xAI's revenue to around $100 million a year. For comparison, Anthropic is reportedly on pace to generate $1 billion in revenue this year, and OpenAI is targeting $4 billion by the end of 2024. Musk said this summer that xAI is training the next generation of Grok models at its Memphis data center, which was apparently built in just 122 days and is currently powered partly by portable diesel generators. The company hopes to upgrade the server farm, which contains 100,000 Nvidia GPUs, next year; in its press release, xAI said it plans to fully double that number. (Because of their ability to perform many calculations in parallel, GPUs are the favored chips for training and running models.) In November, xAI won approval from the regional power authority in Memphis for 150MW of additional power -- enough to power roughly 100,000 homes. To win the agency over, xAI pledged to improve the quality of the city's drinking water and provide the Memphis grid with discounted Tesla-manufactured batteries. But some residents criticized the move, arguing it would strain the grid and worsen the area's air quality. Tesla is also expected to use the upgraded data center to improve its autonomous driving technologies. xAI has expanded quite rapidly from an operations standpoint in the year since its founding, growing from just a dozen employees in March 2023 to over 100 today. In October, the startup moved into OpenAI's old corporate offices in San Francisco's Mission neighborhood. xAI has reportedly told investors it plans to raise more money next year. It won't be the only AI lab raising immense cash. Anthropic recently secured $4 billion from Amazon, bringing its total raised to $13.7 billion, while OpenAI raised $6.6 billion in October to grow its war chest to $17.9 billion. Megadeals like OpenAI's and Anthropic's drove AI venture capital activity to $31.1 billion across over 2,000 deals in Q3 2024, per PitchBook data.

Elon Musk's xAI receives another $6B in funding as Grok app looms

Elon Musk's AI company, xAI, raised another $6 billion in funding, TechCrunch reported via the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing reports that each investor, of nearly 100, had to give a minimum of $77,593. The investors were not named in the filing, but X wrote in a press release that key investors included "A16Z, Blackrock, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Kingdom Holdings, Lightspeed, MGX, Morgan Stanley, OIA, QIA, Sequoia Capital, Valor Equity Partners, and Vy Capital, amongst others." "xAI's most powerful model yet, Grok 3, is currently training and we are now focused on launching innovative new consumer and enterprise products that will leverage the power of Grok, Colossus, and X to transform the way we live, work, and play," the press release stated. "The funds from this financing round will be used to further accelerate our advanced infrastructure, ship groundbreaking products that will be used by billions of people, and accelerate the research and development of future technologies enabling the company's mission to understand the true nature of the universe." Tech Crunch reported that this doubles xAI's total raised funds and brings it to $12 billion. According to CNBC, xAI was aiming for a $50 billion valuation in November. Forbes reported on Monday that the valuation has reached over $40 billion since the $6 billion funding bump.

Musk's AI startup raises further $6 bn

Billionaire tech mogul Elon Musk's startup xAI said it had raised $6 billion from investors in its latest funding round, as it battles stiff competition in the artificial intelligence market. The firm, whose flagship product is the Grok chatbot, garnered support from US venture capitalists, chipmakers NVIDIA and AMD, and investment funds from Saudi Arabia and Qatar among others. Musk has repeatedly warned that AI poses a risk to human civilization, but he is pushing hard for a bigger slice of investment in the sector and xAI already raised $6 billion in May. The company is now one of the world's most valuable startups with an estimated $50 billion valuation, though still dwarfed by chief competitor OpenAI's estimated $157 billion. Despite the sky-high estimates, critics have pointed out that AI firms are burning through cash and still have no clear path to profitability. Announcing the funding on Monday, xAI said it would use the cash injection to "ship groundbreaking products that will be used by billions of people". It would also "accelerate the research and development of future technologies enabling the company's mission to understand the true nature of the universe". Musk, who also acts as boss of SpaceX and Tesla and is a chief backer of US president-elect Donald Trump, wrote on his X account that "a lot of compute is needed" to power AI products. He launched the company in July 2023 shortly after he signed an open letter calling for a pause in the development of powerful AI models. Musk is currently taking legal action against ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, which he co-founded as a non-profit in 2015 before leaving in 2018, alleging that its conversion to a for-profit company breaks legally binding commitments.

Elon Musk's xAI raises $6 bln in funding round including Nvidia, AMD By Investing.com

Investing.com-- xAI, the artificial intelligence start-up founded by billionaire Elon Musk, said on Monday it had raised $6 billion in a series C funding round, which included participation from NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) and AMD (NASDAQ:AMD). The latest round puts xAI's valuation at more than $40 billion, according to multiple reports, and comes after a series B funding round earlier this year also raised $6 billion. Participants in this funding round included venture capitalist majors including a16z, Kingdom (TADAWUL:4280) Holdings and Sequoia. Investment giants Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) and BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) also participated in the round, as did tech majors Nvidia and AMD. xAI said the new funds will be deployed towards building more AI infrastructure and furthering the development of its flagship models. The company aims to compete with major AI firms such as OpenAI with its Grok AI model.

Musk's AI startup raises USD6B

PARIS (AFP) - Billionaire tech mogul Elon Musk's startup xAI said it had raised USD6 billion from investors in its latest funding round, as it battles stiff competition in the artificial intelligence market. The firm, whose flagship product is the Grok chatbot, garnered support from United States (US) venture capitalists, chipmakers NVIDIA and AMD, and investment funds from Saudi Arabia and Qatar among others. Musk has repeatedly warned that artificial intelligence (AI) poses a risk to human civilisation, but he is pushing hard for a bigger slice of investment in the sector and xAI already raised USD6 billion in May. The company is now one of the world's most valuable startups with an estimated USD50 billion valuation, though still dwarfed by chief competitor OpenAI's estimated USD157 billion. Despite the sky-high estimates, critics have pointed out that AI firms are burning through cash and still have no clear path to profitability. Announcing the funding on Monday, xAI said it would use the cash injection to "ship groundbreaking products that will be used by billions of people".