Elon Musk’s SpaceX is seeking the largest initial public offering (IPO) of all time, with a filing it submitted to the United States Securities and Exchange Commission showing that it is looking to raise $75bn, more than double the current IPO record held by oil giant Saudi Aramco.
The national oil company of Saudi Arabia raised almost $30bn following its stock market debut in 2019.
An IPO marks the moment a private company goes public, opening itself up to investment from the general public on a stock exchange. Before that, shares in the company are held only by its founder or founders, employees with share options and private investors.
SpaceX said in an amendment to its initial filing that it plans to offer 555,555,555 shares of common stock at $135 per share, resulting in an IPO worth approximately $75bn in total. It is expected to begin trading on the Nasdaq on 12 June, making its price estimate one of the earliest in history.
The amendment comes a week after Space Exploration Technologies Corp. – SpaceX’s official name – offered an unprecedented glimpse into its mission, mindset and finances with its initial filing.
SpaceX’s Ambitious Mission
In the prospectus summary, the company described its mission as building “the systems and technologies necessary to make life multiplanetary, to understand the true nature of the universe, and to extend the light of consciousness to the stars”.
Achieving that mission, SpaceX says, requires what it calls the most ambitious, vertically integrated innovation engine on and off Earth, capable of manufacturing and launching space-based communications, harnessing the Sun to power artificial intelligence for scientific discovery and ultimately building “a base on the Moon and cities on other planets”.
SpaceX’s ambitious IPO is unique in that it is largely focused on future markets that the company is especially well placed to access. In the document, SpaceX describes itself as “truly building the infrastructure of the future”.
The company argues that space represents the largest economic frontier in human history. Its connectivity infrastructure, it says, is designed to give people around the world access to education, healthcare, entertainment and communications, while helping them overcome traditional limits such as physical and political borders.
SpaceX also says that AI infrastructure in space could use the virtually limitless power of the Sun and turn artificial intelligence into a transformative force for scientific discovery and everyday life. The convergence of these areas, the company argues, could enable “an unprecedented expansion in the global economy, leading to an age of abundance”.
The Emergence of “Trillion-Dollar Markets”
The document repeatedly refers to the future emergence of “trillion-dollar markets”, specifically related to lunar, Martian and other solar industries, and lists as one of the company’s strengths a “Unique Ability to Scale New Trillion-Dollar Markets Across Space, Connectivity, and AI”.
SpaceX lists several future markets it says it will be able to access, including point-to-point terrestrial travel, space tourism, in-orbit manufacturing and asteroid mining. For the Moon and Mars, it points to passenger and cargo transport, energy production and manufacturing capabilities.
Speculative technologies and proposals such as non-Earth-based and orbital data centers and a “permanent human colony on Mars with at least one million inhabitants” receive frequent mention, including as milestones tied to the vesting of restricted shares for Musk.
If SpaceX’s shares sell at the stated $135 price, Musk, already the world’s wealthiest man, could become the first trillionaire in history. He would also maintain significant control over the company after the IPO, with 82% of the voting power of SpaceX’s common stock, according to the proposal contained in the document.
AI Companies Are Surging in Value
SpaceX launched a website highlighting the IPO and encouraging visitors to create a brokerage account so that they can request shares in the company once it goes live on the stock market. Despite the share price set out in the amended document, the company cautions that the final price will be determined on 11 June, the day before public trading opens, by investor demand and market conditions.
The company’s bid for public investment comes during a wave of similar tech activity. AI giant and SpaceX rival Anthropic said earlier this week that it planned to sell shares later this year.
The announcement comes after extensive private funding for Anthropic, which valued the company at just under $1tn. Another AI rival, OpenAI, recently saw a valuation of more than $850bn, reflecting the surging value of companies developing artificial intelligence capacity.