🚀 xAI raises $6B

Market Overview
Read time 1.4 minutes

Year To Date Performances:

1. Elon Musk’s AI startup, xAI, has raised $6 billion in a Series B funding round, valuing the company at $18 billion pre-money. Investors include Valor Equity Partners, Vy Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, Fidelity, and Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal's Kingdom Holding. xAI, which was spun out of Musk's social network X, aims to compete with AI giants like OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google. The funds will be used to market its products, build infrastructure, and accelerate R&D. xAI's flagship chatbot, Grok, available to X's Premium+ users, has faced criticism for generating misleading information, despite the company's goal to develop “truthful” AI systems.

2. BEIJING — David Beckham will promote Alibaba's international e-commerce platform, AliExpress, as its global brand ambassador, marking the company's biggest such partnership to date. This move comes as rivals PDD Holdings' Temu and online fashion startup Shein rapidly expand globally, with Temu even advertising at the Super Bowl. AliExpress, which has joined several Chinese firms in sponsoring the UEFA European soccer championship starting in mid-June, plans extensive promotions including a chance for app users to win game tickets. Beckham’s company reported $92.5 million in revenue in 2022. Alibaba International Digital Commerce Group, which includes AliExpress, saw a 45% year-on-year sales increase to $3.79 billion in the first quarter of 2024 but also reported increased losses due to aggressive investments in emerging markets. Other Chinese sponsors of UEFA Euro 2024 include Alipay, BYD, Hisense, and Vivo.

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4. Headlines

   1. SEC has approved an Ethereum ETF.

   2. Boeing announced it lost $4B in Q1 2024 and expected to continue burning through its reserves due to continued delivery issues and rising costs.

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