Earlier this month, it appeared that all but two of Elon Musk’s 11 co-founders at his AI startup xAI had departed the company. Now, according to Business Insider, the remaining two co-founders, Manuel Kroiss and Ross Nordeen, have left as well.
The outlet reported that Kroiss informed people of his departure from xAI. It then reported that Nordeen left the company a few days later.
Musk recently stated that xAI “was not built right the first time around,” and is now “being rebuilt from the foundations up.” The company was recently acquired by Musk’s SpaceX. This move brings SpaceX, xAI, and X, formerly known as Twitter, together under one corporate umbrella. This consolidation comes as SpaceX is reportedly planning to go public.
Kroiss and Nordeen both reported directly to Musk. Kroiss led the company’s pretraining team, while Nordeen was described as Musk’s right-hand operator. Nordeen reportedly joined xAI from Tesla and was involved in planning major layoffs at Twitter after Musk acquired that company in 2022.