Elon Musk has recently made some waves in the technology world by establishing a new AI (Artificial Intelligence) company – X.AI Corporation – that is set on challenging OpenAI. Founded in Nevada, USA and curiously kept shrouded in mystery, this new venture is mostly unknown to the public and was only uncovered after various business documents were found containing Musk’s name in the list of owners. Documents from the state business filing department also showed that the corporation was founded on 9th March.
X.AI is reportedly going full-force towards launching a competing product against OpenAI, with Musk personally investing in hiring talented engineers and heavy-duty processors needs for the challenge. One of these engineers is the renowned Igor Babuschkin, who formerly had a role at the DeepMind company. Furthermore, Musk has reached out to his contacts and potential investors for funding the project.
This is a rather sudden move from Musk, who for some reason, is not broadcasting any details about the company – especially for someone who tweets about every small thing in his life. It seems as though he is planning to take on Google, Microsoft and OpenAI who have been researching and developing AI technologies over the decades.
What is more intriguing is that Musk was a co-founder of OpenAI when it was created in 2015 but disappeared from its board three years later during 2018 due to conflicting visions with the company. While OpenAI was a non-profit R&D firm, most owners wanted the organisation to shift to a profit-generating company.
Recently, Musk also sent out an open letter calling for a pause in all kinds of AI work and development, claiming that it poses a serious risk to humanity. With this latest move, his stance on the matter is highly questionable and as of now, no one knows the real motives behind his new venture.
X.AI Corporation is not the only AI business venture to be recently founded, though it is the one with the most public attention due to Elon Musk’s involvement. Regardless, it’ll be interesting to watch how Musk’s company will advance in the rapidly-growing AI sphere and which products will it eventually put out against its open-source competition.
