In a recent statement, Elon Musk has firmly denied claims that his artificial intelligence startup, xAI, has engaged in talks to secure a share of Tesla’s future revenue in exchange for providing the electric vehicle company with access to its technology and resources. This denial comes in response to a report by The Wall Street Journal, which suggested that Tesla was considering licensing xAI’s AI models to enhance its driver-assistance software and other technological features.
According to the report, xAI was purportedly set to support Tesla’s development of various functionalities, including a voice assistant for its vehicles and advanced software for its humanoid robot, Optimus. The proposed arrangement reportedly included a revenue-sharing agreement, with xAI executives negotiating for a significant portion of Tesla’s revenue from its Full Self-Driving (FSD) technology.
Musk took to his social media platform, X, to refute these claims, stating that Tesla has benefited from discussions with xAI engineers without needing to license any technology. He described the Journal’s report as “not accurate” and emphasized that Tesla has made substantial progress towards achieving unsupervised FSD independently.
The report also touched on speculation that Musk might reallocate resources from Tesla to xAI, a concern that was heightened when Musk announced a potential $5 billion investment in xAI earlier this year. Despite these concerns, Musk has maintained that xAI is focused on advancing Tesla’s technology, particularly through potential integration of xAI’s chatbot, Grok, with Tesla’s software and supporting the construction of a new data center.
The denial from Musk comes amid ongoing interest in xAI’s role in the AI landscape, as the company aims to compete with established players like Microsoft-backed OpenAI.
As of now, there is no indication of a formal agreement between xAI and Tesla regarding a revenue-sharing model, and the companies appear to be moving forward with their respective technological advancements independently.
