xAI, the artificial intelligence (AI) firm co-founded by Elon Musk, has raised USD 6 billion in its Series C funding round, with participation from key investors including A16Z, Blackrock, Fidelity Management and Research Company, Kingdom Holdings, Lightspeed, MGX, Morgan Stanley, OIA, QIA, Sequoia Capital, Valor Equity Partners and Vy Capital, among others, the company said in a blog post on December 24. Strategic investors Nvidia and AMD also participated in the round.
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Accelerating AI Infrastructure
With the new funding, the company aims to accelerate its infrastructure and the development of new AI products, including the deployment of its flagship Grok language model and Colossus supercomputer. This funding will also accelerate product offerings for both enterprise and consumer markets, particularly with recent launches like Grok 2 and Aurora, an AI-driven image generation model.
Grok 2, Colossus, and Aurora
Since its Series B in May 2024, xAI said it has made significant technical progress in AI technology, including the launch of Colossus, the world's largest AI supercomputer, powered by 100,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs. The system was operational in 122 days, with plans to double its GPU count.
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Doubling Colossus
"Soon, xAI will double the size of Colossus to a combined total of 200,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs, achieved by using the Nvidia Spectrum-X Ethernet networking platform," the company said.
Additionally, the company introduced Grok 2, an advanced language model with state-of-the-art reasoning capabilities, and the xAI API, offering developers programmatic access to foundation models.
xAI's Aurora image generation model enhances multimodal capabilities, while Grok on X integrates real-time world insights into the platform.
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Launching Grok 3
"xAI's most powerful model yet, Grok 3, is currently training and we are now focused on launching innovative new consumer and enterprise products that will leverage the power of Grok, Colossus, and X to transform the way we live, work, and play," the company said in the blogpost.
"The funds from this financing round will be used to further accelerate our advanced infrastructure, ship groundbreaking products that will be used by billions of people, and accelerate the research and development of future technologies enabling the company's mission to understand the true nature of the universe," the company added.
xAI says it is primarily focused on developing advanced AI systems that are truthful, competent, and maximally beneficial for all of humanity.
