Elon Musk's xAI startup receives huge investment from Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a well-known Saudi investor, has invested into billionaire Elon Musk's $24 billion startup called xAI.

The move shows Saudi Arabia's growing interest in artificial intelligence.

The Musk's startup xAI focuses on developing advanced AI systems, including Grok, which is AI chatbot for his social media site X.

Recently, xAI announced that it secured $6 billion in Series B funding, with Prince Alwaleed and other firms like Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Valor Equity Partners, and Vy Capital participating.

The company's website reported that Prince Alwaleed's Kingdom Holding and its chairman as key investors.

Kingdom Holding Company's (KHC) 5% is listed on the Saudi stock exchange and remaining 95% is owned by Prince Alwaleed.

Elon Musk's startup also enjoys the backing by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund, which acquired a $1.05 billion stake in xAI in 2022. The fund has approximately $900 billion in assets.

Elon Musk intends to use the newly raised funds to launch xAI's initial products, enhance infrastructure, and accelerate research and development for future technologies. 

The startup will start releasing exciting updates and product announcements in the coming months.

The Kingdom Holding also has a stake in Musk's social media platform X (formerly Twitter). 

It should be mentioned that Prince Alwaleed's investment portfolio covers US bank Citigroup, ride-hailing service Lyft, and luxury hotel chains like Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts, Hotel George V in Paris, and the Savoy Hotel in London.

Additionally, he owns a significant share of Arabic-language media firm Rotana.