The AI startup behind the controversial Grok chatbot is in early talks to raise billions, with backing from Saudi Arabia’s PIF.

In a livestream with xAI colleagues, the billionaire entrepreneur described current AI systems as “primitive” and not for “serious” commercial use.

Built using huge amounts of computing power at a Tennessee data center, Grok is Musk’s attempt to outdo rivals such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini in building an AI assistant that shows its reasoning before answering a question.