xAI and Anthropic signed a deal: why it raised doubts

xAI, Elon Musk's company, has signed a deal with Anthropic — one of the leading competitors in the development of large language models. The authors of the Equity podcast have expressed skepticism about the real value of this agreement.

What Is Known About the Deal

Unfortunately, both companies have not disclosed the details of the agreement. It is unclear whether this is a strategic partnership, investment, merger, or something entirely different. Against the backdrop of numerous announcements and rumors in the AI industry, such information scarcity raises questions among investors and analysts. TechCrunch and the authors of the Equity podcast have expressed skepticism about the real value of this deal. In an industry where competition is the main driver of innovation, a merger of direct competitors requires very strong justification, which is currently lacking.

Why the Skepticism

xAI develops the Grok model, which directly competes with Claude from Anthropic. Both companies are competing for the same users, investors, and scientific talent. Why would they unite in such a situation? Possible explanations:

• SpaceX's deep pockets allow it to invest in a competitor
• Strategic control over Claude's development
• Exchange of technologies and data for model training
• Regulatory reasons that are not discussed publicly

But without official details, all of this is just speculation.

SpaceX and the Big Picture

The big question is how SpaceX fits into this story. The company is already involved in rockets, satellites, and Starlink. Why is its owner investing in AI through xAI and now through Anthropic? Possibly for integrating AI into SpaceX systems, but this remains unconfirmed.

"This is a strange deal at a strange time," — this kind of reflection

dominates in the investment community.

The Context of the Race

Against the backdrop of intense competition between OpenAI, Google DeepMind, Meta, and other leaders, this agreement looks unusual. If this is simply an investment without actual merger of development efforts — it may not change market dynamics at all.

What It Means

Investors are waiting for more information to understand whether this is a strategic innovation or a financial maneuver. At this point, the deal raises more questions than it answers.