Divisive billionaire Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence startup xAI is closing in on a $6 billion funding round with Sequoia Capital, according to a Bloomberg report.
A “person familiar with the matter” said the funding will value xAI at $18 billion.
xAI intends to compete with ChatGPT developer OpenAI, the AI giant he founded in 2015 and subsequently left before suing this year for allegedly betraying its founding principles.
xAI open-sourced its ChatGPT killer Grok, which is a reference to a neologism coined by Robert Heinlein in his 1961 sci-fi novel Stanger in a Strange Land, in March.
Other investors will take part in the funding round alongside Sequoia, according to Bloomberg.