xAI, Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company, has raised a staggering $6 billion in funding, according to a recent filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. This brings the company's total valuation to $50 billion, more than double its valuation just six months ago.

The new funding round saw 97 investors participate, with each contributing a minimum of $77,593. However, the identities of these investors remain undisclosed. Notably, only investors who had backed xAI in its previous fundraising round were permitted to participate in this one, with some investors who helped finance Musk's Twitter acquisition reportedly gaining access to up to 25% of xAI's shares.

xAI, founded by Musk last year, has been rapidly developing its flagship generative AI model, Grok. Grok has been integrated into X, the social network formerly known as Twitter, and is now powering a number of features, including a chatbot accessible to X Premium subscribers and free users in some regions. Grok has been touted as "maximally truth-seeking" and less biased than competing models, although there is evidence to suggest that it leans to the left.

Musk has been critical of other AI systems, such as ChatGPT, for being too "woke" and "politically correct." In contrast, Grok has been designed to be more willing to answer "spicy questions" and engage in more provocative conversations. The model has also been integrated with the open image generator Flux, allowing it to generate images on X without guardrails, a feature that has sparked controversy.

xAI is rapidly expanding its capabilities, with plans to release a standalone consumer app similar to OpenAI's in December. The company has also launched an API, allowing customers to build Grok into third-party apps, platforms, and services. Additionally, xAI is preparing to release a range of new features, including enhanced search capabilities, account bios, and post analytics.

Despite its rapid progress, xAI is still facing significant competition from other AI labs, including OpenAI and Anthropic. Musk has accused OpenAI of "actively trying to eliminate competitors" like xAI by extracting promises from investors not to fund them. However, Musk has also argued that X's data gives xAI a leg up compared to rivals, and that the company's models could be trained on data from his various companies, including Tesla and SpaceX.

xAI has outlined a vision in which its models would improve technology across Musk's companies, and is already powering customer support features for SpaceX's Starlink internet service. The startup is also in talks with Tesla to provide R&D in exchange for some of the carmaker's revenue. However, Tesla shareholders have sued Musk over his decision to start xAI, arguing that he has diverted both talent and resources from Tesla to what's essentially a competing venture.

Despite these challenges, xAI has driven revenue to around $100 million a year, with plans to raise more money next year. The company has expanded rapidly from an operations standpoint, growing from just a dozen employees in March 2023 to over 100 today. xAI has also moved into OpenAI's old corporate offices in San Francisco's Mission neighborhood.

The AI venture capital activity has been booming, with megadeals like OpenAI's and Anthropic's driving the sector to $31.1 billion across over 2,000 deals in Q3 2024, according to Pitchbook data. As xAI continues to ramp up its capabilities and expand its reach, it will be interesting to see how the company fares in the increasingly competitive AI landscape.