In August, billionaire and Tesla CEO Elon Musk claimed that through xAI, he would create a Microsoft clone called Macrohard, focused solely on AI software development.“It’s a tongue-in-cheek name, but the project is very real!” Musk admitted.
According to Elon Musk:
“In principle, given that software companies like Microsoft do not themselves manufacture any physical hardware, it should be possible to simulate them entirely with AI.”
More recently, the executive shared more information about the project after DogeDesigner on X shared a photo MACROHARD being painted on the roof of the Colossus II supercomputer cluster in Memphis.
Elon Musk is literally painting MACROHARD on the roof of the Colossus II supercomputer cluster in Memphis.Here’s what it’s going to look like: pic.twitter.com/FrFCMeySJKOctober 12, 2025
Elon Musk reposted the picture with a bit of more context about the Macrohard project, which he claims will be “profoundly impactful at an immense scale.”
Our goal is to create a company that can do anything short of manufacturing physical objects directly, but will be able to do so indirectly, much like Apple has other companies manufacture their phones.
Elon Musk
The @xAI MACROHARD project will be profoundly impactful at an immense scale 😉 Our goal is to create a company that can do anything short of manufacturing physical objects directly, but will be able to do so indirectly, much like Apple has other companies manufacture their… https://t.co/7mDcBOxFLiOctober 12, 2025
This means that we could potentially see Macrohard give Microsoft a run for its money in the software development landscape. But perhaps more interestingly, Musk plans to use AI-powered agents to automate tasks like coding, project management, and more, which could potentially help cut costs while maximizing profits.
Can AI be trusted to run a company?
But if the past few months are anything to go by, companies should tread carefully when integrating AI into their workflows. In August, Replit’s AI coder deleted a company’s code base during a 12-day vibe coding experiment. “It deleted our production database without permission,” Jason Lemkin, an investor in software startups, indicated. Possibly worse, it hid and lied about it.”
Turns out, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates was onto something when he claimed that coding is too complex to fully replace humans using AI. This is despite previously claiming that the technology would replace humans for most things, save for activities that we’d like to preserve exclusively for humanity. He joked that no one would like to watch computers playing baseball.
This news comes as Microsoft is trying to reshape its strategy from Bill Gates’ rigid software factory vision. The software giant wants to shift focus to AI, security, and quality.
When Bill founded Microsoft, he envisioned not just a software company, but a software factory, unconstrained by any single product or category. That idea has guided us for decades. But today, it’s no longer enough.
Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella
Elon Musk is admitted one of the biggest critics of Microsoft and OpenAI’s multibillion-dollar partnership. When the latter launched GPT-5, Musk claimed that“OpenAI is going to eat Microsoft alive.”
However, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman seemed unfazed by the claims. “People have been trying for 50 years, and that’s the fun of it! Each day you learn something new, and innovate, partner, and compete,” added Microsoft’s CEO.
Musk has filed multiple lawsuits against the ChatGPT maker and its CEO Sam Altman, citing a stark betrayal of its founding mission, alleged involvement in racketeering activities, and a fake humanitarian mission.
“OpenAI, Inc. has been transformed into a closed-source de facto subsidiary of the largest technology company in the world: Microsoft,” added Musk in one of the lawsuits.
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