What does xAI—the company that just acquired microblogging platform X in an all-stock deal worth $33 billion—do? On Friday, the world’s richest individual, Elon Musk, announced that he had sold X (formerly Twitter) to xAI. Now, what is xAI and what does it do? Does xAI not also belong to Musk? All this may seem confusing at once. So here’s everything we know about this development at this point.
What is xAI, the Elon Musk company that bought X?
Here are 10 things to know about xAI:
- xAI is an AI-centric company headquartered San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA.
- “AI’s knowledge should be all-encompassing and as far-reaching as possible. We build AI specifically to advance human comprehension and capabilities,” states the xAI portal, x.ai. The xAI website also states solving real problems as its objective.
- The company was founded by Musk in March 2023, with an aim “to understand the true nature of the universe”.
- Today, xAI is a well-established player in the world of AI.
- xAI rivals the likes of Microsoft-backed OpenAI and Chinese startup DeepSeek.
- xAI has developed the Grok series of AI-powered chatbots.
- For the unversed, Grok is able to create text and engage in human-like conversations with users.
- Is there a connection between Grok and X? Well, yes, Grok boasts the capability to access real time information through X. The deal is widely viwed to enable xAI’s ability to train its Grok chatbots.
- In Musk’s own words, xAI and X’s “futures are intertwined”. “Today, we officially take the step to combine the data, models, compute, distribution and talent,” the billionaire wrote on X while announcing the xAI-X deal.
- On its website, xAI says its goal is to solve “real problems”, and “not interested in speed for speed’s sake”. At its core, xAI is a “focused and mighty team connected by our curiosity, commitment, and unwavering drive”.
Deal to Acquire X | Isn’t X part of the same group led by Musk?
In business parlance, such a move is typically described as a consolidation, where an entity belonging to the same umbrella as the target company buys out the target company. In simpler terms, it is the process that involves the act of combining two or more companies into a single entity, sometimes to cut costs, increase efficiency or unlock value for shareholders.
In the case of xAI and X, while much of the contours of the deal remain unclear, this is how Musk has described it:
The move, he wrote on X, would “unlock immense potential by blending xAI’s advanced AI capability and expertise with X’s massive reach”.
Also, the deal values xAI at $80 billion and X at $33 billion, with the combined entity set to “deliver smarter, more meaningful experiences to billions of people while staying true to our core mission of seeking truth and advancing knowledge”.
Musk’s Twitter purchase, its rebranding to X and now the xAI deal…
Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX who is also serving as senior advisor to US President Donald Trump, changed erstwhile Twitter’s name to X after purchasing it for $44 billion back in 2022.
The acquisition followed months of an ocean of updates and seesaw moves in socks before the deal finally saw the light of the day. Musk then became the CEO of the company in a major management change that saw the firing of much of its original staff and revised policies.
Currently, Musk, the world’s richest individual, heads the Department of Government Efficiency in the Trump administration.
ALSO READ: Trump buys Red Tesla Model X, praises Musk
xAI is hiring, by the way!
According to the xAI portal, the company is hiring across all its offices in San Francisco and Palo Alto in California, USA, and London in the UK.
The company prioritises “in-person work to support our fast-paced, collaborative projects. Exceptional candidates are welcome to apply from anywhere”, according to the portal.
In February, xAI rolled out Grok 3, sending shockwaves in AI universe (and making headlines)…
In February, xAI launched Grok 3, which immediately became the buzzword among netizens, reportedly giving witty responses and also refusing to answer intermittently.
The chatbot, touted as “the smartest AI on Earth” with 10 times more capability than its predecessor, immediately caught the Internet’s attention, especially when users started to share their experiences publicly.
Defending the bot, Musk said Grok is the “most fun AI in the world!”
ALSO READ: Elon Musk’s xAI Unveils Grok 3: ‘Smartest AI on Earth’ gets 10x more reasoning capabilities?
Doonited Affiliated: Syndicate News Hunt
This report has been published as part of an auto-generated syndicated wire feed. Except for the headline, the content has not been modified or edited by Doonited
