xAI reportedly lays off 500 workers from data annotation team

Elon Musk’s AI startup xAI laid off 500 staff members on Friday night time, in line with internal messages viewed by Business Insider.

These emails reportedly announce a direct “strategic pivot,” with the corporate deciding to  “speed up the enlargement and prioritization of our specialist AI tutors, whereas scaling again our deal with normal AI tutor roles.”

“As a part of this shift in focus, we not want most generalist AI tutor positions and your employment with xAI will conclude,” xAI reportedly wrote.

In response to Enterprise Insider, these cuts signify about one-third of xAI’s 1,500-person information annotation staff — the staff that works to label and put together information used to coach xAI’s chatbot Grok.

When contacted for affirmation, xAI pointed to a statement on X (the Musk-owned social community that it acquired earlier this year) declaring that the corporate “will instantly surge our Specialist AI tutor staff by 10x.”

“We’re hiring throughout domains like STEM, finance, drugs, security, and plenty of extra,” the corporate mentioned.