Last week, approximately 10 employees were laid off at xAI. Recent departures include founding members of Mistral AI.

Golden Finance reported that on May 9, just weeks after an acquisition buyout option worth $60 billion was obtained for this code startup by a company under Elon Musk, Cursor has begun to gradually exert influence within the AI division under SpaceX.

According to two insiders, Cursor employees had visited the xAI office to meet with internal staff and discuss work matters. The insiders said that afterward, xAI saw consecutive staff departures, and layoffs were carried out last Friday.

One insider said that last week’s layoffs affected about 10 employees across various xAI teams involved in the development of the Grok large model. Another insider revealed that as of last autumn, the xAI research team had a size of around 200 people, and there is currently no confirmed information about the total number of employees.

Recent xAI departures also include Devendra Chaple. He is a founding member of Mistral AI and Thinking Machines Lab. When he joined xAI in March this year, he was regarded as a major talent acquisition and reported directly to Musk. The insiders said he left after only about a month on the job. In recent weeks, employees responsible for xAI’s data center business have also been laid off.