Elon Musk has announced the forthcoming launch of the inaugural AI model from his recently launched artificial intelligence startup, xAI. The launch, as confirmed by Musk, is set for this Saturday and is anticipated to spark substantial industry interest.
Musk vs Big Tech: An AI Race
Musk has long held critical views of Big Tech’s approaches towards artificial intelligence, and this venture seems to be his latest rebuttal. By promising the delivery of an AI model that seeks maximum truth and aims to probe the very essence of the universe, Musk is directly challenging existing AI tools like Google’s Bard and Microsoft’s Bing Chat.
Musk, a co-founder of OpenAI, has been increasingly expressing his disappointment with OpenAI since ChatGPT was released in 2022 , although he has been critical about the Microsoft partnership for years. Musk thinks OpenAI has deviated from its original goal of being open-source and non-profit. His allegations came to a head when he claimed that Microsoft is largely in control of OpenAI due to a billion-dollar investment made by the company in 2019, succeeded by a $10 billion investment this year.
“OpenAI had become a closed-source, maximum-profit company” Musk tweeted in February, pointing to what he believes is a diversion from the AI startup’s initial vision. He also shared plans to create TruthGPT, an AI chatbot poised to compete with OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Tomorrow, @xAI will release its first AI to a select group.
In some important respects, it is the best that currently exists.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 3, 2023
xAI: Born from DeepMind & Windows
xAI was established earlier this year by a team with an impressive background in AI research. The company’s roots span to Google’s DeepMind, Microsoft’s parent company, and other leading AI research organizations. Despite Musk’s other enterprises, namely X — previously known as Twitter — and xAI functioning as separate entities, the firms maintain close collaborative links. xAI also works in cooperation with Tesla and several other companies.
The company’s website states that xAI is “pro-humanity” and will adhere to ethical principles and values in its research and development. It also says that xAI will work closely with Musk’s other companies, such as Twitter, Tesla and SpaceX. xAI is separate from X Corp, Musk’s holding company that owns Twitter.
In an unexpected development in September, co-founder of Oracle, Larry Ellison, an outspoken confidante of Musk’s, revealed that a contract had been signed between Oracle and xAI. The terms of the agreement allow xAI’s AI model to be trained on Oracle’s cloud.
Last Updated on November 8, 2024 10:18 am CET
