Musk and xAI: Summer Work, Reorgs, and Growth

Elon Musk spent the summer at xAI, stepping back from his Washington role to focus on engineering and compute projects that the company is building. While he split time between offices and field sites, he has been closely engaged with the Memphis Colossus supercomputer build, which powers xAI’s Grok chatbot and underpins much of the firm’s model training.

In September the company reorganized rapidly, and at least 500 data annotators were laid off as teams were shifted toward specialist tutoring and model engineering roles. Its finance chief left in July and later joined OpenAI; the firm had completed a $5 billion debt raise earlier in 2025, moves that reflect how quickly capital and personnel have been reallocated.

xAI also completed an all-stock merger that folded X into the AI company earlier this year, combining social data and compute under one roof. The startup is expanding to new engineering hubs — including Seattle, with job postings that list salaries up to $440,000 — and it has seen fast promotions, mass departures, and public scrutiny that have left employees and observers calling the period chaotic.

That March merger valued xAI at about $80 billion and X at about $33 billion, making the combined group one of the highest-profile private AI companies in 2025. The firm then raised $5 billion in debt and another $5 billion in equity, moves that financed rapid infrastructure builds but also intensified scrutiny of governance and staffing choices. If the company stabilizes its teams and clarifies strategy, engineers and investors may regain confidence; if not, turnover could continue.