Will SpaceX's IPO fund life on Mars — and a trillionaire?

Elon Musk has a habit of turning science fiction into reality. From reusable rockets to autonomous electric vehicles and humanoid robots, the billionaire's ventures often achieve what was once thought impossible. With SpaceX's initial public offering (IPO), he's aiming for even bigger milestones.

The company, which has stayed fiercely private for 24 years, is now preparing to go public. In an S1 filing to US regulators on Wednesday, which runs to hundreds of pages, SpaceX plans to raise roughly $75 billion (€64.5 billion) from new investors, which would value the company at up to $1.75 trillion.

Not bad for a firm that is still loss-making and which Musk — already the world's richest man — will effectively still control.

Colonizing Mars, asteroid mining, orbital AI data centers

Musk wants SpaceX to do more than send astronauts into space. He plans to build the infrastructure to secure the future of human life beyond Earth. The ultimate goal, Musk has said, is to create self-sustaining cities on Mars that could be home to up to a million people.

To achieve that, SpaceX plans to use Starship — its giant reusable spacecraft — to make the first uncrewed voyages by 2030. The one-way journey to the Red Planet covers about 140 million miles on average and takes roughly six to nine months. The initial missions will test landing systems and begin setting up basic infrastructure, with crewed voyages to follow a few years later.

SpaceX also wants to use resources on celestial bodies much closer to Earth to support humanity's multi-planetary expansion. Musk believes that asteroids, which fly through space on shifting orbits, could one day be mined.

The near-zero gravity on asteroids makes it far easier and cheaper to land on them and extract materials. However, large-scale asteroid mining of platinum, nickel, gold and ice (water) — all vital for supporting life, building habitats and producing fuel on Mars — won't be achieved until the 2040s or beyond, space industry analysts have predicted.

A crucial first stepping stone, however, will be the moon, which is only a three-day trip from Earth. SpaceX envisions habitats, factories and fuel depots could be built on the moon — a much cheaper option than launching tons of materials from Earth.

Data centers in space: Solution or disaster?

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Musk also believes space has an answer to one of the biggest problems facing artificial intelligence (AI) — the enormous amount of power and cooling required for massive data centers to handle billions of user requests at once.

Instead of building more of these power-hungry facilities on Earth, SpaceX has floated the idea of placing giant AI supercomputers in orbit on large arrays of satellites.

These data centers could use unlimited sunlight for energy and the cold vacuum of space for free cooling, making large-scale AI training far cheaper and more efficient than on our home planet.

Unremovable Musk — the world's first trillionaire?

If SpaceX's ambitions aren't crazy enough, the IPO's plans to elevate Musk — already the world's richest person — are truly out of this world.

Musk currently owns an estimated 42% of SpaceX. At the targeted $1.75 trillion valuation, his stake alone would be worth roughly $735 billion. Combined with Musk's holdings in Tesla, xAI and other ventures, the IPO would likely push his total net worth past the $1 trillion mark, making him the first trillionaire in history.

A special dual-class share structure gives Musk over 80% of the voting power despite owning a much smaller share of SpaceX equity. This setup effectively makes him unfireable as CEO, helping him to pursue long-term, high-risk projects without pressure from short-term investors or activist shareholders.

Musk's ironclad control has drawn criticism before, most notably at Tesla, where shareholders sued over his massive pay packages and potential conflicts of interest, arguing the board lacks real independence. Similar concerns have arisen over his control of the social media platform X, where decisions like major layoffs and strategic shifts were made by him.

The blockbuster listing will also create enormous wealth for early backers and executives. According to the Financial Times, SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell and CFO Bret Johnsen would see their shares exceed $1 billion in value. Longtime investor Antonio Gracias could be sitting on $70 billion or more, while PayPal co-founder Luke Nosek's stake would be worth around $5 billion.

Record float, Wall Street's boldest bet

Wall Street is gearing up for what could be the largest IPO in history, with Goldman Sachs acting as the lead underwriter.

If SpaceX does secure an additional $75 billion in funding, it would be nearly triple Saudi Aramco's previous record of approximately $29.4 billion in 2019. Before that, Alibaba's US listing was the largest share offering, raising $22 billion in 2014.

A $1.75 trillion valuation would place SpaceX in the Top 10 of the world's largest public companies, alongside Nvidia , Apple, Google owner Alphabet and Microsoft.

This would mark a huge leap of faith by investors as SpaceX remains deeply unprofitable, reporting a $4.94 billion net loss in 2025 due to heavy investments in Starship, satellite deployment and AI resources. 

Due to the enormous hazards of operating extraterrestrially, along with fast-advancing AI, the IPO filing lays out the very real dangers SpaceX faces. These include "a unique range of space-related risks," including "radiation from solar and cosmic sources; micrometeoroids and orbital debris," and "human injury or death."

Wednesday's filing also warns: "We have a history of net losses and may not achieve profitability in the future."

The sky-high valuation has some analysts wondering whether SpaceX's ambitions are more pie-in-the-sky than rocket science — a debate that will only intensify once trading begins on the Nasdaq next month.

Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru