Elon Musk’s xAI Lays Off Hundreds of Generalist AI Tutors, Shifts Focus to Specialist Roles
Elon Musk’s xAI Lays Off Hundreds of Generalist AI Tutors, Shifts Focus to Specialist Roles
Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence venture, xAI, implemented significant layoffs on Friday night, impacting at least 500 workers from its data annotation team. The company cited a strategic pivot, accelerating its focus on specialist AI tutors while scaling back generalist roles.
Employees received emails notifying them that their employment would conclude immediately, with access to company systems terminated the same day. Workers are to be paid through either the end of their contract or November 30.
This move comes as xAI announced on X (formerly Twitter) its plan to expand its team of specialist AI tutors by tenfold. The company is actively hiring across various domains, including STEM, finance, medicine, and safety, aiming to build what it calls ‘truth-seeking AGI’.
The layoffs follow internal restructuring signals earlier in the week, including the deactivation of senior employees’ Slack accounts and mandatory testing for generalist tutors to determine future roles. The data annotation team is crucial for developing xAI’s Grok chatbot, responsible for contextualizing and categorizing raw data.
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