IPO pipeline strengthens; 38 cos file draft papers in March
05 Apr 2026
Elon Musk’s xAI has witnessed a complete exodus of its original founding team. The departure of Ross Nordeen marks the end of an era for one of the world’s most popular AI companies, which was thrust into the limelight in 2023. Nordeen, who has been a longtime Musk associate and one of the 11 key members who helped build xAI from its earliest days in 2023, was the final original co-founder to leave.
His exit comes just days after the exit of Manuel Kroiss, who led the pretraining team and reported directly to Musk. All eight original co-founders have left since January 2026, including Guodong Zhang, Zihang Dai, Toby Pohlen, Jimmy Ba, Tony Wu, and Greg Yang. Musk remains the only original member on the board.
Nordeen, who is 36 years old, served as Musk’s primary operational lieutenant at xAI. He coordinated priorities and drove execution across multiple workstreams. He also previously worked on Tesla’s Autopilot team as a technical programme manager. Nordeen’s long-standing connection to Musk dates back years, including helping manage staff reductions at Twitter (now X) after Musk’s 2022 acquisition. His employee badge on X has since been removed, confirming his departure.
xAI sees major restructuring after SpaceX merger
The wave of departures has been observed following xAI’s merger with SpaceX earlier in February 2026. The company, which was once valued at around $250 billion, is undergoing a significant rebuild. Musk acknowledged the changes earlier this month, stating, “xAI was not built right first time around, so is being rebuilt from the foundations up.”
In recent months, xAI has shed dozens of employees, including the shutdown of teams working on Grok Imagine (video and image generation) and the Macrohard AI agent project. Despite the high valuation, xAI continues to lag behind rivals like OpenAI and Anthropic in scale, user reach, and product penetration.
Musk on a fresh hiring spree
As the founding team fully departs, xAI is actively rebuilding its workforce. The company has added nearly a dozen new people recently, including talent from Cursor such as Andrew Milich and Jason Ginsberg. Musk has stated that he has been recruiting overlooked candidates (in the past) to strengthen the xAI team from the ground up.
The timing of the leadership change at xAI is notable as Musk prepares for the upcoming SpaceX IPO. The integration of xAI with SpaceX and the ongoing restructuring are seen as a move to position the combined entity more competitively in the fast-moving AI race.
Note that neither Musk, nor xAI have revealed the full reasons behind the individual departures. Critics and the internet have questioned the stability of the high-profile startup, especially after the departures.
