Space Exploration Technologies Corp (SpaceX) has committed US$2 billion to xAI as part of a US$5 billion equity round, deepening the ties between tech billionaire Elon Musk’s ventures as his artificial intelligence (AI) start-up races to compete with rival OpenAI, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.
The investment follows xAI’s merger with X and values the combined company at US$113 billion, with the Grok chatbot now powering Starlink support and eyed for future integration into Tesla’s Optimus robots, the report added.
In response to a post on X about whether Tesla Inc could also invest in xAI, Elon Musk on Sunday said: “It would be great, but subject to board and shareholder approval,” without confirming or denying the Journal report on SpaceX’s investment plans in xAI.
Photo: Reuters
SpaceX, xAI and Tesla did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Meanwhile, xAI apologized on Saturday for offensive posts published by Grok this week, blaming them on a software update meant to make it function more like a human.
After the Tuesday upgrade, Grok praised Nazi leader Adolf Hitler in the posts on social media platform X, and suggested that people with Jewish surnames were more likely to spread online hate.
X deleted some of those posts several hours later, amid growing outrage.
“We deeply apologize for the horrific behavior that many experienced,” the company wrote on X on Saturday, adding that it had modified the system “to prevent further abuse.”
The company said the change occurred after the chatbot was prompted to “reply to the post just like a human” as well as “tell it like it is and you are not afraid to offend people who are politically correct.”
As a result, Grok became susceptible to users’ “extremist views,” which made it produce “responses containing unethical or controversial opinions to engage the user.”
Despite recent controversies involving Grok’s responses, Musk has called it “the smartest AI in the world,” and xAI continues to spend heavily on model training and infrastructure.
Additional reporting by AFP
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