While the device has a questionable future, Elon Musk’s SpaceX is taking on Apple by shifting into AI hardware, reportedly showing investors a prototype before the company’s IPO.
SpaceX’s artificial intelligence arm, xAI, has been working on a considerably more grounded product it wants to sell to consumers, as it competes against Apple Intelligence and other AI platforms. One that doesn’t involve being blasted off the planet.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Elon Musk’s rocket company has worked on a prototype for an AI device for some time. It was shown off to investors and other stakeholders before the company’s IPO.
SpaceX tempered expectations for the device as being an early-stage project and that it could still change design. There’s also a chance it could cancel it altogether.
Few details have emerged about it, but witnesses say it has a sleek design and is slimmer than an iPhone. It runs on a proprietary operating system, which takes advantage of xAI’s technology to function.
Inside the casing, the device will eventually use a Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset. Little else is known about it at this time.
As it is described as an early-stage prototype, it will be quite some time before it becomes a shippable product. And, it may never arrive.
A tricky market to crack
SpaceX’s attempt to come up with a device follows after attempts by others to do the same thing. Attempts that ultimately resulted in failure.
The highest profile commercial cratering was the Humane AI Pin, which was a $700 unit that also required a $24 per month subscription. That experiment resulted in sales of the technology, staff moving on to HP, and the pins being switched off.
Then there was the Rabbit R1, a similar effort that initially boasted of the use of a “Large Action Model” to control apps on the user’s behalf. While it was significantly cheaper, it also didn’t fare well in the open market.
It turns out that creating a new form factor for AI is a tough problem to solve.
It’s a field that Apple is also wading into with its own efforts. That too apparently involves an AI pin or pendant as one option.
Then there’s Apple Glass, the Cupertino version of smart glasses. Though an initial version won’t necessarily include augmented reality, Apple is still planning to use AI with them, thanks to some onboard cameras.
There’s also the left-field option of AirPods packed with cameras. It’s effectively the same concept as smart glasses, but without the glasses bit.
Whatever Apple chooses for its own take on the AI hardware concept, it at least has some stiff competition from Musk and co.
A threat coming true?
The news of an Elon Musk company making an AI device that’s thinner than an iPhone is interesting, considering Musk’s love-hate relationship with Apple.
Back in November 2022, Elon Musk was musing about his trouble with Twitter, now X. At the time, there were allusions to Twitter potentially being taken down from the App Store, and Google doing the same in the Play Store, due to a sudden relaxation of moderation following a post-acquisition shake-up.
Since Twitter’s failure to moderate its users went against App Store policies on the topic, there were concerns that Twitter could be pulled from distribution. That led to Musk complaining in public about the affair.
At one point, someone proposed that Musk could create his own smartphone if Apple and Google ejected Twitter. Cue Musk saying he would make an “alternative phone” if there was no other choice.
It was almost certainly a throwaway remark, but at the same time, it could’ve driven him to look at the possibility too. After all, the Boring Company did sell “flamethrowers” online on a whim.
Musk’s companies certainly had the technology, the talent, and the resources to make a mobile device. A few years later, and it seems like it’s becoming a reality.
