EspaceX acquires xAI. Since this merger of two Musk companies became a rumor, crazy numbers like $1.5 trillion started to be spent So when discussing SpaceX’s total valuation, you could sum it up by saying “The combination of SpaceX and xAI gets you the biggest IPO of all time!” » and yes, it’s more plausible than ever. For reference, SpaceX’s valuation was estimated at around $800 billion less than two months ago.
But is this merger as stupid as it seems?
The combined company will be a “vertically integrated innovation engine,” according to a new SpaceX press release with Elon Musk’s personal signature on it. According to its own estimates, the company now deals with “AI, rockets, space Internet, direct communications to mobile devices and the world’s first real-time information and free speech platform.” Another way of saying this might be that SpaceX is now the company behind vertical landing rocket boosters, the majority of satellites currently in orbitvery large rockets that tend to explodeA ISPthe microblogging app known as X, a sassy chatbot called Grok famous for its lewd images, and much more.
SpaceX will now own, for example, Grokipedia, the AI-written anti-woke parody of Wikipedia. And remember Vine, the defunct 6-second video social media app? Yes SpaceX, which owns billions of dollars in contracts with the Pentagon and is responsible for NASA crewed missions, now also owns the rights to Vine. Musk claims it brings it back “in AI form”.
As many have done pointed out in front of meSpaceX has become a truly indispensable player in humanity’s efforts at aerospace and space travel through an iterative process involving an extraordinary number of spectacular and public rocket explosions that certainly would not have been tolerated if SpaceX were a government agency. He’s always walked a delicate tightrope, keeping boring people happy, while also being subject to the nonsense and horrors that come with being led by Elon Musk.
Gwynne Shotwell, President and COO of SpaceX, was described by the Wall Street Journal as “Musk’s translator, particularly for officials who depend on SpaceX but are sometimes disrupted by its activities.” In that same Journal article, former NASA administrator Bill Nelson, also a former Democratic senator, called Shotwell the company’s “steady hand” and added, “I have great confidence in her. For that reason, I have great confidence in SpaceX.”
Back in 2022While Musk was in the process of buying Twitter in the most chaotic way possible, Nelson says he called Shotwell and said, “Tell me that whatever distraction Elon might have on Twitter won’t affect SpaceX.”
“I assure you that’s not the case,” she told him. “You have nothing to fear.”
Now imagine being Shotwell four years later. Twitter is now X. Last year, the proprietary AI chatbot on X briefly started calling himself “MechaHitler” at one pointand then that generated tons of photos of scantily clad children. So not only has the drama been heightened, but you’re also the president and COO of the company that made all of this.
And imagine Shotwell having to manage this merger while Musk, the famous CEO of this attention-starved conglomerate, spent his last days while trying has job extricate himself from any consequences or disapproval caused by the public disclosure of the emails in which he repeatedly asked Jeffrey Epstein if he could party on his private island.
So we can only speculate about Musk’s mental state when he finalized the plans for this merger. But what strikes me is that he wants investors in xAI and SpaceX – and maybe from Junefuture holders of publicly traded SpaceX shares – to believe that this merger creates a company that solidifies and has a unified agenda. But you might want to take as big a bong as possible before trying to understand this program, as Musk describes it in his press release:
This rocket and AI company will actually be an AI company in space, you see, because, in Musk’s estimation, “within 2 to 3 years, the cheapest way to generate AI calculations will be in space.” After all, “in the long term, spatial AI is obviously the only way to evolve.” Obviously.
But training models with spatial computing is just the beginning, as Musk says that by combining these two concepts, they will “evolve to create a sentient sun for understanding the Universe.”
Businesses don’t always have to make sense. Samsung has hotels. Red Bull has a nature magazine. Konami has aerobics rooms. Sometimes these incongruities are thriving holdovers from another era for a company, but sometimes they reveal the caprice or frivolity of the company’s management, which is no big deal.
But then again, it’s not an exaggeration to think that Elon Musk’s whim – and the fact that a powerful subset of Wall Street bulls think caprice equals wisdom – they could soon control the world’s best-funded AI company at a time when AI is the structural framework that supports the entire economy. If the IPO goes well (New York Times sources say Musk hopes to raise $50 billion), this AI company will be in your 401(k) while it is also in charge of astronauts’ lives.
In other words, we are heading toward a time when the Wall Street bulls will have to be right. More than ever, Elon Musk’s whim could duty actually be wisdom, as improbable as that may seem. AI better not be a bubble if this IPO goes well, and the value of Musk himself better not be inflated either. Perhaps our entire well-being depends on it.
