On May 1, Microsoft reportedly instructed engineers of its AI infrastructure to prepare to host Elon Musk’s xAI startup Grok AI model. OpenAI sentiments revealed that hosting Grok could complicate their relationship with Microsoft.
The report revealed the tech giant has been in discussions with xAI to host the Grok AI model and make it available to customers and Microsoft’s product teams through the Azure cloud service.
Grok AI might be introduced to Microsoft’s AI Foundry Service
Microsoft revealed that the xAI Grok model will be available on Azure AI Foundry, Microsoft’s AI development toolkit, which gives developers access to AI services, tools, and pre-built models to build AI applications and agents.
The report revealed that the model will allow Microsoft’s developers to use it within their apps and for Microsoft to use it across its apps and services. According to the post, Microsoft has not yet shared any comment on the matter.
The report added that it’s unclear if Microsoft will make an exclusive deal on hosting the Grok AI model or whether other cloud providers, such as Amazon’s AWS, will also be allowed to host the model.
Microsoft reported recently that it has been developing in-house AI reasoning models to reduce reliance on OpenAI and has begun testing models from xAI, Meta, and China’s DeepSeek as potential replacements for its Copilot AI assistant.
Microsoft incorporated Deepsek’s R1 model availability on its Azure platform and GitHub tool for developers weeks after gaining popularity. Microsoft revealed that it is only looking at providing the capacity to host the Grok model and not the servers for training future models.
xAI chief Elon Musk canceled a potential $10 billion server deal with Oracle last year, at the time that xAI would be moving to train its future models internally instead of relying on Oracle servers.
Satya Nadella, CEO at Microsoft, has been pushing for Microsoft to host Grok, as he’s eager for Microsoft to be seen as the hosting provider for any popular AI models. He added that Microsoft Azure AI teams are constantly onboarding new models or procuring hardware that unlocks even more AI capabilities.
OpenAI’s Sam Altman in feud with xAI’s Elon Musk
Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT maker and Microsoft partner OpenAI, and Musk have been in a wrangle lately over OpenAI’s future. Musk sued OpenAI and Altman last year, alleging they had abandoned the startup’s original goal of being a non-profit organization.
Open-AI countersued Musk last month, citing a pattern of harassment by Musk and asking a federal judge to stop Musk from any further unlawful and unfair action. Musk and OpenAI cofounded OpenAI in 2015, but Musk left before it became a technology star.
Press attacks and malicious campaigns broadcast to Musk’s over 200 million followers online revealed a pretextual demand for corporate records, harassing legal claims, and a sham bid for OpenAI’s assets. Musk has tried every tool available to hurt OpenAI, the company CEO said in a video posted on Reddit.
OpenAI said: “Elon’s nonstop actions against us are just bad faith tactics to slow down OpenAI and seize control of the leading AI innovations for his benefit.”
According to Nadella, making Grok available to developers through Azure is part of Microsoft’s goal to become an important infrastructure and platform for AI agents and models. He added that this doesn’t mean AI labs are turning to Microsoft for their AI model training needs.
Cryptopolitan Academy: Want to grow your money in 2025? Learn how to do it with DeFi in our upcoming webclass. Save Your Spot
