SpaceX owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk at the Axel Springer Awards ceremony on December 1, 2020 in Berlin. Hannibal Hanschke – Getty Images
Elon Musk’s X may be on the rise, but another company owned by the billionaire is on its way to reaching dizzying heights. Musk is in talks to sell $500 million to $750 million in SpaceX shares at a valuation of $175 billion or more, Bloomberg reported Wednesday, citing unnamed sources. The numbers mean the private space giant, which still has not announced plans to go public, is valued higher than any IPO in U.S. history, surpassing Alibaba’s 2014 IPO valuation of $169 billion.
The latest private market valuation for SpaceX also represents a significant increase from the $150 billion valuation the company enjoyed in July, when new and existing investors bought $750 million worth of shares. And it would value SpaceX higher than American corporate giants like Disney, which has a market cap of $170 billion, and Comcast, which is worth just over $171 billion.
That’s in stark contrast to another Musk company, X – formerly Twitter – which has seen its value plummet since Musk delisted it a year ago. Insiders report that $19 billion worth of shares were offered to X employees in October, while other calculations suggest that the value of
The terms and scope of SpaceX’s tender offer could change. And SpaceX did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment on the recent private market valuation.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is expected to bring in $9 billion in revenue in 2023, rising to about $15 billion next year, Bloomberg reported last month. The company has established a leadership position in the space transportation market, conducting more than 64% of commercial rocket launches in the first six months of this year to carry satellites, scientific instruments and other payloads into orbit around the world.
As he seeks to gain market share in both the space transportation and satellite markets, Musk has assembled an extensive roster of industry talent at SpaceX, including former top NASA engineers and Apple product designers. Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite company that aims to provide internet coverage in 60 countries while focusing on hard-to-reach areas, saw revenue rise from $222 million in 2021 to $1.4 billion last year, the Wall reported Street Journal in September.
The impressive performance led to rumors last month that SpaceX could spin off Starlink and take it public as early as the end of 2024. But Musk called those reports “false,” and billionaire Tesla and SpaceX investor Ron Baron said he doesn’t expect Starlink to go public until 2027.
Originally posted 2023-12-07 23:48:17.