Elon Musk’s xAI Loses Half Its Founding Team in Just One Week — And He’s Calling It a “Reorganization”

In a shocking turn of events that has the tech world buzzing, Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI has seen six of its original twelve co-founders exit the company in just one week, with Musk himself confirming that the departures were not voluntary. The news has sparked intense speculation about the future of the company, which has been at the center of controversy in recent months.

The Exodus Begins

The departures began on February 6th, when Ayush Jaiswal, an engineer at xAI, announced his resignation on X (formerly Twitter). He wrote, “This was my last week at xAI. Will be taking a few months to spend time with family & tinker with AI.” This was just the beginning of a wave of exits that would rock the company.

Over the next week, a total of 11 engineers, including six co-founders, publicly announced their departures from xAI. The co-founders who left include Yuhuai (Tony) Wu, Jimmy Ba, and others who were instrumental in the company’s early days. The rapid pace of these departures has led to widespread speculation about the internal dynamics at xAI and the reasons behind the exodus.

Musk’s Response: “Reorganization” or “Push”?

In an all-hands meeting on Tuesday night, Musk suggested that the exits were about fit, not performance. “Because we’ve reached a certain scale, we’re organizing the company to be more effective at this scale,” he said, according to The New York Times. “And actually, when this happens, there’s some people who are better suited for the early stages of a company and less suited for the later stages.”

However, Musk’s tone shifted on Wednesday when he posted on X, making it clear that these departures were not voluntary. “xAI was reorganized a few days ago to improve speed of execution,” Musk wrote. “As a company grows, especially as quickly as xAI, the structure must evolve just like any living organism. This unfortunately required parting ways with some people.”

Musk’s comments have been met with skepticism, with many questioning whether the departures were truly about reorganization or if there were deeper issues at play. The fact that several engineers followed the co-founders out the door, and that at least three are starting something new together, suggests that the departures may reflect more than just a simple restructuring.

A New Venture on the Horizon?

Among the departing employees, three have hinted at starting a new venture together. Yuhuai (Tony) Wu, who was the reasoning lead at xAI, wrote in his resignation post, “It’s time for my next chapter. It is an era with full possibilities: a small team armed with AIs can move mountains and redefine what’s possible.” Similarly, Shayan Salehian, who worked on product infrastructure and model behavior post-training, announced that he was leaving to “start something new.”

The new venture, which has not yet been named, is reportedly being built by former xAI engineers who are eager to explore new opportunities in the rapidly evolving AI landscape. The move has sparked excitement in the tech community, with many speculating about what this new venture could mean for the future of AI.

Controversy and Scrutiny

The departures come at a time of significant controversy for xAI. The company is facing regulatory scrutiny after its AI model, Grok, was found to have created nonconsensual explicit deepfakes of women and children that were disseminated on X. French authorities last week raided X offices as part of an investigation into the matter.

In addition to the controversy surrounding Grok, xAI is also moving toward a planned IPO later this year, after being legally acquired by SpaceX last week. The company’s rapid growth and ambitious plans have made it a target for both praise and criticism, with some questioning whether it can maintain its momentum in the face of these challenges.

The Future of xAI

Despite the departures, xAI maintains a headcount of over 1,000 employees, so the exits are unlikely to affect the company’s short-term capabilities. However, the rapid pace of the recent departures has taken on a life of its own online, with users jokingly announcing on X that they too are “leaving xAI” despite never having worked there—a sign of how quickly the narrative of a “mass exodus” snowballed on Musk’s social network.

Still, forced co-founder exits are rarely a sign of smooth scaling. While Musk frames the reorganization as calculated, the fact that several engineers followed the co-founders out the door—and that at least three are starting something new together—suggests the departures may also reflect deeper tensions. In frontier AI, where talent is scarce and reputation matters, xAI’s ability to attract and retain top researchers will be tested as it competes with OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google.

Timeline of Departure Announcements

The following employees have publicly announced their departures from xAI on X in recent days:

• February 6: Ayush Jaiswal, engineer
• February 7: Shayan Salehian, product infrastructure and model behavior post-training
• February 9: Simon Zhai, MTS (member of technical staff)
• February 9: Yuhuai (Tony) Wu, co-founder and reasoning lead
• February 10: Jimmy Ba, co-founder and research/safety lead
• February 10: Vahid Kazemi, ML PhD
• February 10: Hang Gao, multimodal efforts, including Grok Imagine
• February 10: Roland Gavrilescu, engineer
• February 10: Chace Lee, Macrohard founding team
• February 11: Andrew Ma, app and recommendation model improvements
• February 12: Radhakrishnan (Rad) Venkataramani, reasoning and reinforcement learning systems for Grok

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