Days after SpaceX’s massive initial public offering, which made CEO Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire, the company announced Tuesday it was purchasing Bay Area artificial intelligence startup Cursor for $60 billion.
The move has been anticipated since April, when the companies announced a deal that SpaceX would either pay Cursor $10 billion for “coding or knowledge work AI,” or purchase it later this year. That same month, Business Insider reported SpaceX was renting out massive computing space in Colossus, its Memphis, Tennessee, data center, and two senior Cursor employees left the startup to work directly for Musk on SpaceX’s coding product.
Tuesday’s deal is part of an effort to boost Musk’s AI company, xAI, which has fallen behind key competitors following multiplecontroversies and an exodus of the coding company’s co-founders in March.
“We look forward to working closely with the SpaceX team to advance our frontier AI capabilities and continue to work closely with our customers and partners,” said Cursor CEO Michael Truell in a statement…