#xai

#xai

Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI is facing a second lawsuit alleging it is illegally emitting toxic pollutants from its enormous datacenters, which house its supercomputers and run the chatbot Grok. The new pending suit alleges xAI is violating the Clean Air Act and was filed Friday by the storied civil rights group the NAACP. The group's 40-page notice of intent to sue alleges xAI has been polluting Black communities near its facility in Southaven, Mississippi.

Elon Musk's bankers are looking to trim the debt that xAI has taken on over the past few years, following the company's merger with SpaceX, a new report from Bloomberg says. xAI has built up $18 billion in debt over the past few years, with some of this being attributed to the purchase of social media platform Twitter (now X) and the creation of the AI development company. Bankers are trying to create some kind of financing plan that would trim "some of the heavy interest costs" that come with the debt. The financing deal would help trim some of the financial burden that is currently present ahead of the plan to take SpaceX public sometime this year.

The past few days have been a wild ride for xAI, which is racking up staff and cofounder departure announcements left and right. On Tuesday and Wednesday, cofounder Yuhuai (Tony) Wu announced his departure and that it was "time for [his] next chapter," with cofounder Jimmy Ba following with a similar post later that day, writing that it was "time to recalibrate [his] gradient on the big picture."

On its own, it's a pretty standard tech departure announcement - but it's part of a troubling pattern for the lab. Five members of the company's 12-person founding team have now left the company, with four of the departures coming in just the last year. Infrastructure lead Kyle Kosic left for OpenAI in mid-2024, followed by Google veteran Christian Szegedy in February 2025.

Elon Musk is reportedly looking to finally take SpaceX public after years of resistance, according to sources who spoke to The Wall Street Journal. The company has long said it wouldn't choose an IPO until it had established a presence on Mars. That isn't happening anytime soon. So why now? Company insiders have suggested it's because Musk wants to build AI data centers in space. Google recently announced it was looking into putting a data center in space, with test launches scheduled for 2027.

How is xAI building its data centers so quickly? Through temporary licenses, Ghori said. "It was the fastest way to get the permitting through and actually start building things," Ghori said. "I assume that it will be permanent at some point." Ghori said that the temporary leases were an exception granted by the local government, one made for carnivals. The host, Ti Morse, laughed: "So xAI is actually just a carnival company?" "It's a carnival company," Ghori responded.

Elon Musk moved within reach of an unprecedented $800 billion net worth after private investors sharply increased the valuation of xAI Holdings, his artificial intelligence and social media company. A newly confirmed $20 billion funding round valued the business at $250 billion, adding an estimated $62 billion to Musk's fortune and widening his lead as the world's wealthiest individual. Forbes confirmed that xAI Holdings was valued at $250 billion following its $20 billion funding round.