Half of xAI’s Founding Team Has Now Departed

As of this week, exactly half of xAI’s original founding team has left the company

Late Monday night, co-founder Yuhuai (Tony) Wu announced his departure in a post on X. “It’s time for my next chapter,” he wrote. “It is an era with full possibilities: a small team armed with AIs can move mountains and redefine what’s possible.”

Less than 24 hours later, another co-founder followed. On Tuesday afternoon, Jimmy Ba — who reported directly to Elon Musk — shared his own farewell message. “Enormous thanks to @elonmusk for bringing us together on this incredible journey,” Ba wrote. “So proud of what the xAI team has done and will continue to stay close as a friend of the team.”

Taken individually, both announcements read like standard Silicon Valley exits: gracious, forward-looking, and carefully worded. But together, they signal a deeper shift. Wu and Ba are the fifth and sixth members of xAI’s 12-person founding team to depart. Notably, five of those exits have happened within the past year.

The wave began in mid-2024, when infrastructure lead Kyle Kosic left for OpenAI. Google veteran Christian Szegedy followed in February 2025. In August, Igor Babuschkin departed to launch his own venture firm, and just last month, Microsoft alum Greg Yang stepped away, citing health reasons.

By most accounts, these splits have been amicable. Nearly three years after launch, it’s not unusual for founders to reassess their paths. Musk’s leadership style is famously demanding, and with SpaceX’s acquisition of xAI complete and an IPO reportedly on the horizon, early team members may be sitting on substantial equity windfalls. In today’s red-hot AI funding environment, it’s also an ideal moment for senior researchers to strike out on their own.

Still, there are potential headwinds. xAI’s flagship product, Grok, has faced criticism for erratic behavior and reports of internal tampering the sort of challenges that can strain even strong technical teams. More recently, changes to xAI’s image-generation tools led to a surge of deepfake pornography on the platform, triggering reputational damage and possible legal consequences.

Whatever the individual motivations, the cumulative effect is hard to ignore. An IPO will subject xAI to a level of scrutiny it hasn’t faced before. Musk is reportedly pushing ambitious plans, including orbital data centers, and expectations around Grok’s competitiveness against OpenAI and Anthropic continue to rise.

The AI arms race isn’t slowing down. And as xAI moves toward its next chapter, retaining top talent may be just as critical as shipping the next model.