xAI hires ex-Nvidia specialists to build ‘world models’

Elon Musk’s AI company xAI has recruited two former Nvidia specialists—Zeeshan Patel and Ethan He—to accelerate work on advanced “world models,” the Financial Times reported, citing people familiar with the plans. 

World models are AI systems trained on video and robotics data to simulate and reason about physical environments, a capability that extends beyond the text-focused models behind chatbots such as ChatGPT and xAI’s Grok. 

The hires signal xAI’s push to develop AI that can design and navigate real-world spaces, with potential uses in gaming and robotics. Media summaries of the FT report say the company aims to build interactive 3D environments and robot-ready perception systems; Nvidia’s own work in simulation via its Omniverse platform provides relevant expertise the recruits are expected to bring. 

Musk has also teased entertainment applications, saying on X that xAI plans to release an AI-generated game before the end of next year. Tech outlets covering the FT story note that such a title would likely showcase world-model capabilities. 

The moves place xAI among rivals including Meta and Google, which are also racing to develop AI that understands causality and physics—seen as essential to pushing AI from software-only tools toward embodied, real-world use.