Elon Musk v. OpenAI, SpaceXAI and Anthropic deal, Cerebras IPO

In this episode of Get the Check, the pod breaks down three big stories: the Elon vs. OpenAI trial, SpaceXAI's compute deal with Anthropic, and the Cerebras IPO at a $49B valuation.

They start with the trial. Greg Brockman's personal journal got subpoenaed and read aloud in court, with entries saying "we weren't honest with [Elon]." Meanwhile, Elon admitted under oath that xAI distilled OpenAI's model, which is a clear violation of OpenAI’s terms & services. The biggest legal hinge is whether GPT-4o qualifies as AGI. Under OpenAI's original nonprofit charter, AGI had to be shared with the world. If it qualifies, Elon has a case. Kalshi odds have been around 50/50 all week (kalshi.com/sign-up?referral=getthecheck), but Maya and Anika both think the judge rules against him.

Next, the pod gets into the SpaceXAI x Anthropic compute deal. Colossus-1 in Memphis has 300 megawatts of capacity and is running at only 11% utilization (the benchmark for a healthy data center is around 40%). With the SpaceXAI IPO approaching, showing up to public markets with an empty facility would be a red flag, and renting compute to Anthropic is tangible revenue that makes the story look a lot better. The pod also covers SpaceX's moonshot vision of data centers in space. While Maya thinks it’s all PR, Priya was surprised to learn that China already has underwater data centers.

Then comes the Cerebras IPO. The chip design is impressive: one giant wafer built so an entire model fits on a single chip with no inter-chip communication lag. The challenge is that the models have outgrown it. Cerebras can't run anything above GPT-OSS because it can't support the external memory needs of larger models. They're pricing at a 95x revenue multiple on $510M in 2024 revenue, with a $49B valuation. While revenue is growing a lot YoY, revenue is heavily concentrated in the UAE and OpenAI, which is making many chip plays at once. Priya thinks the $20B OpenAI commitment driving most of the hype faces a real threat in the OpenAI and Broadcom partnership. Tune in to find out if the pod would give Cerebras their check. This weeks’s answer is a hot take.

This episode is brought to you by

1. Kalshi, the prediction market the girls are tracking in real time for Elon's trial odds. Sign up at kalshi.com/sign-up?referral=getthecheck.
2. Known, if you’re tired of swiping Known is for you! https://known.com/ is live in SF. Use code GETTHECHECK when you sign up to skip the waitlist.

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00:00 Intro03:03 Elon Musk v. OpenAI15:11 Elon wants Sam Altman to be hated by America16:01 SpaceXAI x Anthropic Deal17:47 SpaceX IPO18:25 Grok is dead21:30 Do we think Elon will win the case21:58 Cerebras IPO23:34 History of GPUs24:47 Limitations of the Cerebras chip31:59 Cerebras’s revenue concentration35:11 Would Cerebras Get Our Check?