--- title: "Elon Musk Is Poaching Tesla Engineers for xAI. Wait, What?" description: "Elon Musk is big mad that OpenAI keeps trying to poach Tesla engineers — so instead, he's poaching them himself. " date: "2024-04-05" modified: "2024-04-05" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/elon-musk-poaching-tesla-xai" categories: - "Advanced Transport" - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Elon Musk" - "Future Society" - "Tesla" - "The Industrialists" - "xAI" tags: - "elon musk" - "OpenAI" - "tesla" - "the digest" --- # Elon Musk Is Poaching Tesla Engineers for xAI. Wait, What? ![Elon Musk is big mad that OpenAI keeps trying to poach Tesla engineers — so instead, he's poaching them himself. ]() *\Image: Beata Zawrzel / NurPhoto via Getty / Futurism\* ## Poached Egg Elon Musk is big mad that OpenAI keeps trying to poach Tesla engineers — so instead, he's stealing them for another of his ventures. Responding to [reporting from *The Information*]() about Tesla machine learning researcher Ethan Knight going over to [xAI](), Musk's latest artificial intelligence gambit, the multi-hyphenate billionaire admitted that the move came only after OpenAI tried to poach his own employee first. "Ethan was going to join OpenAI," [Musk said]() in a response to perennial reply guy Sawyer Merritt, "so it was either xAI or them." As you may recall, Musk was one of the original cofounders of OpenAI and [left the firm in 2018]() amid reported differences in opinion regarding what direction it should be taking. About a year later, the company announced that it would be [opening a for-profit arm](), which has clearly chagrined its most famous cofounder in the interim. Ever since, he's been in something of a blood feud with the firm. It's not exactly shocking that OpenAI would seek to lift researchers from Musk-owned companies, especially considering that he's allegedly [attempted to do the same]() — and as the rest of his comments indicate, it's clear not only that this is the latest forte in his ongoing battle with the company he helped start, but also that he might not be exactly winning this one. "They have been aggressively recruiting Tesla engineers with massive compensation offers," Musk continued, "and have unfortunately been successful in a few cases." ## Insult to Injury Strangely enough, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO also seemed to trash his employee after correcting Merritt's insistence that Knight was the "computer vision chief" at the electric vehicle company. "Ethan is very talented," [Musk said]() in another response, "but 'vision chief' would be overstating things." He then took the opportunity to brag Tesla's AI and autonomy team, which he said includes "over 200 excellent engineers." "Tesla’s pace of progress with autonomy is accelerating," Musk said, apropos to nothing. "The talent war for AI is the craziest talent war I’ve ever seen!" One odd takeaway: because both Tesla and xAI are in desperate need of AI luminaries, two of Musk's companies are now in direct competition for the same hiring pool — and one of them is now officially poaching from the other. **More on Tesla:** [*Tesla's "Nightmare" Year Off to a Horrible Start: "Only One Person Responsible For This"*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()