xAI, the artificial intelligence (AI) startup founded by Elon Musk, has lost two more co-founders, adding to mounting questions over talent retention as the company accelerates its race against entrenched AI rivals.
Reuters reported that Tony Wu and Jimmy Ba said in posts on X that they had resigned from the company they helped start less than three years ago. Neither disclosed the reasons for their departures or their next steps, though both thanked Musk. Their exits leave xAI with half of its original 12 co-founders.
The departures come amid reports of rising internal pressure to boost model performance as Musk pushes xAI to narrow the gap with OpenAI and Anthropic.
The Financial Times reported that Ba’s exit followed tensions within xAI’s technical ranks over increasingly aggressive performance demands. Ba did not respond to requests for comment on the report.
