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LeCun Calls Musk’s xAI Failure After $2.5 B Loss

6/18/2026

43 9 Full Breakdown

Summary

LeCun Slams xAI

Yann LeCun told CNBC that Elon Musk’s AI lab xAI is a failure.
LeCun said Musk’s behavior hinders hiring AI talent.
xAI rents its Memphis Colossus data centers to Anthropic and Google, with Google paying SpaceX $920 million monthly.
SpaceX acquired xAI in February 2026, valuing the firm at $1.25 trillion, and after a $75 billion IPO the AI segment posted a $2.5 billion Q1 loss.
All 11 non-Musk co-founders, including Ross Nordeen, have left.

Summary

LeCun Criticizes Musk

Yann LeCun, founder of AMI Labs, disclosed he personally owns a Tesla.
Yann LeCun said Tesla’s Full Self-Driving feature is not truly autonomous but remains useful for drivers.
Yann LeCun revealed that Ross Nordeen, the last non-Musk co-founder, was abruptly cut off from xAI’s internal systems and removed from a group chat.
Yann LeCun criticized Elon Musk’s AI predictions as overly optimistic and affirmed that SpaceX is doing great stuff.

History

Historical Context

Researchers such as Nils Nilsson (1995) and Marvin Minsky (who organized a 2004 symposium) warned that AI had narrowed to specific tasks, spurring the artificial general intelligence movement that birthed DeepMind in 2010. DeepMind’s 2014 sale to Google and the 2015 launch of OpenAI as a nonprofit with a $1 billion pledge (only $130 million raised by 2019) set the stage for today’s corporate-AI power struggles.

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LeCun Slams xAI

Yann LeCun told CNBC that Elon Musk’s AI lab xAI is a failure.
LeCun said Musk’s behavior hinders hiring AI talent.
xAI rents its Memphis Colossus data centers to Anthropic and Google, with Google paying SpaceX $920 million monthly.
SpaceX acquired xAI in February 2026, valuing the firm at $1.25 trillion, and after a $75 billion IPO the AI segment posted a $2.5 billion Q1 loss.
All 11 non-Musk co-founders, including Ross Nordeen, have left.

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