SpaceX Aiming for IPO: What We Know

SpaceX could file its prospectus as soon as this week, according to The Information. The company is widely expected to go public this year and could be the largest IPO of all time. Barron’s estimates it could seek to raise $30 billion, which would top Aramco’s 2019 IPO of $29 billion. After its recent merger with xAI, the company’s valuation is widely estimated at over $1 trillion.

Besides its high-profile rocket launches and plans to colonize Mars, SpaceX runs Starlink, Musk’s satellite internet service. SpaceX says Starlink is profitable; Starlink said in a 2024 statement that it was available for over 2.8 billion people, including in remote areas like Antarctica or even in space. At that time, it reported 4.6 million customers, and substantial efforts to integrate with travel companies from airlines to railroads to cruise ships.

While the company is private, it’s difficult to know how much money it’s making, but we can put together some estimates. PC Mag reported that a Starlink subsidiary covering most of its satellite sales made $2.7 billion in 2024, mostly from subscription fees, and that the total revenue for the segment could be around double that. In 2025, Elon Musk posted that he expected SpaceX revenue to be around $15.5 billion, making Starlink potentially a third of the business, and Reuters reported that it generated $8 billion in profit that year.

That puts SpaceX’s implied multiple somewhere in the 50s, or higher. Forbes noted an inside tender offer in mid-December of 2025 priced shares at $421, which “effectively doubled the company’s valuation in just five months.”

Why would investors be willing to pay up? SpaceX controls the majority of space launches right now, and its ability to reuse rocket parts makes it cost-effective. It has contracts with NASA and the Department of Defense – and rescuing the stranded astronauts when Boeing’s (BA) Starliner failed underscored its technological successes.

Additionally, Elon Musk recently unveiled the Terafab project, a joint venture between SpaceX, xAI, and Tesla (TSLA). Getting into the entanglements between Musk’s companies would be another column altogether. Terafab aims to consolidate all aspects of semiconductor production in one facility, built on Tesla’s Giga Texas campus.

The project is critical for Tesla in particular, which is trying to pivot into humanoid robotics. Musk has said that established chipmakers aren’t able to produce fast enough for his companies’ needs. Morgan Stanley estimates that the humanoid robots alone could require 20 million chips per year. If built, it would be the largest chipmaking facility on the planet, and is projected to cost around $20-$25 billion (though some estimates are nearly double that).

On top of that, Musk aims to put data centers in space. Part of the issue with the AI revolution is where to put these massive data centers – especially as the public worries about potential health concerns and rising energy prices. It would also add to Musk’s existing data and computing empire, and SpaceX would be the one responsible for that segment.

In an application with the FCC in January, it outlined a plan for up to 1 million satellites related to the project. However, there are scientific concerns about the feasibility, and the effect that number of satellites would have on the field of astronomy.

SpaceX is riding the hype of multiple technological fronts. Musk is sharing a dream of the future – investors will have to determine if the financials line up.

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