SpaceX

SpaceX builds and launches rockets and spacecraft, and runs the Starlink satellite-internet network. It flies cargo and astronauts to the International Space Station for NASA, launches satellites for companies and governments, and lifts its own Starlink satellites by the thousands. Its breakthrough was making rocket boosters land and fly again instead of being thrown away, which slashed launch costs and let it dominate the global launch market. Its next act is Starship, the giant rocket meant for the Moon and eventually Mars.

Elon Musk owns and controls SpaceX. He founded it in 2002, holds roughly 42% of the equity, and crucially controls a large majority of the voting shares, so he runs it outright, not as a figurehead. The rest is held by employees and big investors (the likes of Google, Fidelity, and various venture and sovereign funds). There is no parent company and no public shareholders; Musk is firmly in charge.

No, not on any stock exchange. SpaceX is private, so there is no ticker to buy and anyone selling you 'SpaceX shares' online is almost certainly a scam. The only legitimate ways to get exposure are indirect: some private-market funds and pre-IPO platforms hold SpaceX shares (usually for accredited or wealthy investors), and Musk has floated eventually spinning off Starlink in an IPO, which would be a separate stock. Until that happens, regular investors cannot directly own SpaceX.

SpaceX has been valued at around 350 billion dollars in private share deals in 2024–2025, making it the most valuable privately held company in the world, worth more than most listed aerospace and defence giants. That figure comes from tender offers and funding rounds, not a public market, so it reflects what big investors will pay for shares rather than a daily stock price. Starlink's growth is the main reason the valuation keeps climbing.

It depends which part. The launch business has long been a money-maker thanks to cheap reusable rockets and a packed manifest. The big swing factor is Starlink, which burned cash for years building out the satellite network and then reportedly turned cash-flow positive, the moment that flipped SpaceX from a capital-hungry rocket company into a genuinely profitable one. Starship, by contrast, is still a massive ongoing investment that does not pay for itself yet.

Starship is the largest and most powerful rocket ever built, a fully reusable, stainless-steel giant designed to carry huge payloads and, eventually, people to the Moon and Mars. NASA picked a version of it as the lander for its Artemis astronauts. It has gone through a very public 'blow it up, learn, try again' test campaign, with dramatic explosions early on followed by steadily better flights. If it works at scale, it is meant to make spaceflight cheaper by another order of magnitude.

They are partners, not rivals. NASA is the US government space agency that sets missions, funds programs, and does deep science; SpaceX is a private company NASA hires to actually build rockets and fly the missions, usually far cheaper than the old way. NASA astronauts ride SpaceX's Crew Dragon to the ISS, and NASA is paying SpaceX to land humans on the Moon with Starship. So SpaceX is the contractor doing the flying; NASA is the customer and mission director.

Starlink is SpaceX's satellite-internet service, a network of thousands of low-orbit satellites that beam broadband to a dish anywhere on Earth, including rural areas, ships, planes and war zones with no other connection. It is owned and operated by SpaceX, and it is the company's biggest revenue driver. Musk has said Starlink could eventually be spun out as its own publicly traded company, which is the most likely route to ever buying a piece of the SpaceX empire on the stock market.