Musk’s xAI loses second co-founder in two days

San Francisco: xAI, the artificial intelligence startup founded by Elon Musk, has lost its second co-founder in two days, according to public statements.

On Tuesday, influential AI researcher Jimmy Ba announced his departure from xAI in a post on X, thanking Musk and saying he was grateful to have helped co-found the company.

Ba’s exit comes one day after fellow co-founder Tony Wu also announced he was leaving the company.

The departures follow xAI’s recent merger with SpaceX, Musk’s aerospace and defence firm. The all-stock transaction valued SpaceX at $1 trillion and xAI at $250 billion, according to documents cited by CNBC.

Senior exits continue

Ba, a professor at the University of Toronto, played a key role in research that influenced xAI’s Grok 4 models. Several other early leaders have also exited the company, including Igor Babuschkin, Kyle Kosic and Christian Szegedy.

Another co-founder, Greg Yang, announced last month that he would step back from his role to focus on treatment for Lyme disease.

Regulatory scrutiny

The leadership changes come as xAI faces regulatory investigations in Europe, Asia and the United States.

The probes were launched after xAI’s Grok chatbot and image generator were found to have enabled the large-scale creation and distribution of non-consensual explicit images, including content involving minors, according to regulators.

Company background

Musk launched xAI in 2023 with a group of 11 co-founders to compete with major AI developers such as OpenAI and Google. At the time, the company said its mission was to “understand the true nature of the universe.”

xAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment.