Elon Musk’s xAI Fundraising Dance

Elon Musk doesn’t abide by the norms of Silicon Valley, where startups looking to raise money hold formal pitch meetings, during which executives show off fundraising slide decks full of information about their businesses, and outline their expectations around check size and valuation.

So when Musk posted a message on X last Friday, denying a Financial Times report that his artificial intelligence startup xAI was raising $6 billion at a $20 billion, people who know Musk well took his protestations with a grain of salt. In fact, three investors close to Musk and his companies told me they still expect terms of an xAI fundraising round to be finalized between February and March. They said, however, that there is no term sheet, no set valuation or set amount of money that xAI is raising.