Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence (AI) startup, xAI, is set to pay Telegram $300 million to integrate its Grok chatbot onto the popular messaging application. This strategic move aims to leverage Telegram’s extensive user base of over one billion individuals and enhance xAI’s competitive edge in the rapidly expanding artificial intelligence market, as reported by Reuters.
Under the terms of the one-year agreement, xAI will also share 50% of any subscription sales generated through the messaging app with Telegram. Telegram founder Pavel Durov confirmed the deal on Wednesday in a post on X, specifying that the $300 million payment would comprise both cash and stock.
Durov clarified that xAI would only gain access to data that Telegram users explicitly choose to share with Grok through direct interactions with the chatbot.
This partnership could provide xAI, which acquired X earlier this year, with invaluable data to further train and develop its AI models.
With many open-source data repositories becoming exhausted, AI companies are facing increasing challenges in sourcing high-quality data. This scarcity has prompted firms like Meta Platforms to utilize public interactions with AI for model training.
According to its privacy policy, X already uses public posts from its users to train its AI models. However, it was not immediately clear if xAI would adopt a similar approach to utilize data from Telegram.
xAI, which has forged several strategic tie-ups this year to bolster its standing in both AI infrastructure and financial services, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment regarding this latest development.
