Elon Musk’s SpaceX has acquired his AI firm, xAI

Elon Musk’s SpaceX has acquired Musk’s xAI, the businesses announced. The merger will “kind probably the most formidable, vertically-integrated innovation engine on (and off) Earth, with AI, rockets, space-based web, direct-to-mobile machine communications and the world’s foremost real-time info and free speech platform,” Musk wrote in an replace.

The AI firm that proper now’s finest recognized for its CSAM-generating chatbot may appear to be a wierd match for a rocket firm. However SpaceX is vital to Musk’s newest scheme to construct AI knowledge facilities in area. In his replace, Musk wrote that “world electrical energy demand for AI merely can’t be met with terrestrial options” and that transferring the resource-intensive operations to area is “the one logical answer.” SpaceX simply days in the past filed an software with the FCC to create an “orbital data center” by launching 1,000,000 new satellites.

Musk additionally claimed that, finally, space-based knowledge facilities will allow different developments in area journey. “The capabilities we unlock by making space-based knowledge facilities a actuality will fund and allow self-growing bases on the Moon, a complete civilization on Mars and finally growth to the Universe.” Notably, it’s not the primary time Musk has made lofty claims about Mars. He predicted in 2017 that SpaceX would ship crewed missions to Mars by 2024.

This additionally isn’t the primary time Musk has acquired one in every of his personal firms. He merged xAI and X final yr, which implies SpaceX now owns the social community Musk purchased in 2022. And he just lately introduced that Tesla was investing $2 billion into xAI. SpaceX is planning to go public later this yr in an preliminary public providing (IPO) that would worth the corporate at greater than $1 trillion, according to Bloomberg, which notes that SpaceX has additionally “mentioned a doable merger with Tesla.”