Elon Musk’s SpaceX showed investors a prototype of a “handset-like” AI device, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The prototype is reportedly sleeker and slimmer than an iPhone, and appears to be somewhere between a small touchscreen phone and the Rabbit R1. SpaceX reportedly showed the device to investors and stakeholders before making it public, telling them it was still in its early stages and the design could still change.
Musk denied the report, calling it “completely false.”
SpaceX, along with its sister company Tesla, has the manufacturing expertise to mass produce a large number of AI devices. Of course, you also have access to the chips you need for on-device computing. SpaceX has also expressed interest in expanding into the wireless space, with Starlink Mobile as a potential competitor to Verizon and AT&T. One analyst even speculated that T-Mobile or AT&T would be great acquisition targets for the rocket maker, but such an acquisition would definitely be expensive.
It’s also not clear whether SpaceX is simply throwing spaghetti at the wall or whether it actually intends to mass-produce and sell such a device. But what seems clearer is that if OpenAI is doing it, Musk is probably trying to do it better.
As you know, OpenAI is working with former Apple chief design officer Jony Ive to develop an AI device that CEO Sam Altman claims is more peaceful than the iPhone. Reports last fall said the company was struggling to get the details right, and OpenAI recently brought in another Apple executive who could help move things forward. Last week, news broke that Apple’s vice president of Vision Pro headsets, Paul Meade, was joining OpenAI’s hardware team.
Like OpenAI, SpaceX’s prototype runs on its own operating system and is reportedly designed to integrate technology from xAI, Musk’s AI company that SpaceX acquired earlier this year. This prevents these new devices from being locked inside another company’s platform (such as Google’s Android). But the aim also seems to be to create something new with a native AI interface. Still, the graveyard is full of AI devices that companies like Humane and Rabbit have failed to launch. The companies who want to sell AI devices and the consumers who want to buy them are not the same. still.
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