(Apu Gomes/Getty Images)

SpaceX merges with xAI, reportedly will seek an IPO valuation of $1.25 trillion

Elon Musk says his space company has merged with his AI company, with the lofty goal of eventually putting data centers in space.

Nate Becker

2/2/26 4:15PM

Elon Musk’s giant space company has merged with his AI company, according to a letter from Musk posted on the SpaceX website.

As part of the reasoning for the deal, Musk cited a pet idea among tech billionaires: powering AI by placing data centers in space.

“Current advances in AI are dependent on large terrestrial data centers, which require immense amounts of power and cooling. Global electricity demand for AI simply cannot be met with terrestrial solutions, even in the near term, without imposing hardship on communities and the environment.

In the long term, space-based AI is obviously the only way to scale...

By directly harnessing near-constant solar power with little operating or maintenance costs, these satellites will transform our ability to scale compute.”

(This concept, by the way, would be exceptionally hard to pull off.)

After the tie-up, the combined company is aiming to go public at a valuation of about $1.25 trillion, according to Bloomberg, which first reported the merger was happening, citing an internal memo.

Tesla, which Bloomberg had previously reported to have been in consideration to be merged among the companies in some way, wasn’t mentioned in the report of the deal. Shares were roughly flat after-hours.

The move would tie together two of Musk’s signature companies — two of the biggest privately held firms in the world. It would also bundle together rockets, satellites, the social media site X, and artificial intelligence all under one company.

An IPO at a valuation of $1.25 trillion would immediately place the combined SpaceX/xAI into the top 10 most valuable publicly traded companies on US exchanges. It would be one of the biggest global IPOs ever by valuation. (The largest IPO on record is Saudi Aramco, which went public in Saudi Arabia valued at about $1.9 trillion in 2019.)

Various reports had said SpaceX was seeking a valuation topping $1 trillion, and some had even floated a valuation exceeding $1.5 trillion.

Musk’s companies are already extremely interconnected, including Tesla’s recent $2 billion investment in xAI.

Jon Keegan2h

White House releases AI legislative framework

The White House has released its policy wish list for AI legislation — and what it wants excluded.

Still, the odds of any actual AI regulation getting passed in Congress right now are very slim.

The “National Policy Framework” for AI lays out seven issues that the Trump administration wants to see reflected in any congressional action around AI.

The items listed in the framework include:

Child safety protections, age verification, and parental controls for AI.
Data center projects voluntarily pay their own way when it comes to power, but incentives should still be encouraged.
Copyright laws should allow for training models on copyrighted works, while protecting individuals’ voice and likeness.
Free speech should be defended for AI systems, preventing the government from pressuring companies to ban or alter content based on partisan agendas.
A light touch to regulation to encourage innovation, and no federal agency to regulate AI.
American workers vulnerable to AI job replacement should be retrained and supported.
Federal AI rules should preempt any state AI legislation to prevent a patchwork of laws that companies would hate.

The policy list is the latest in a series of proposals from the AI-friendly Trump administration.

President Donald J. Trump Unveils National AI Legislative Framework

The items listed in the framework include:

Child safety protections, age verification, and parental controls for AI.
Data center projects voluntarily pay their own way when it comes to power, but incentives should still be encouraged.
Copyright laws should allow for training models on copyrighted works, while protecting individuals’ voice and likeness.
Free speech should be defended for AI systems, preventing the government from pressuring companies to ban or alter content based on partisan agendas.
A light touch to regulation to encourage innovation, and no federal agency to regulate AI.
American workers vulnerable to AI job replacement should be retrained and supported.
Federal AI rules should preempt any state AI legislation to prevent a patchwork of laws that companies would hate.

The policy list is the latest in a series of proposals from the AI-friendly Trump administration.

SPACE

CASE

Rani Molla, Nate Becker2h

Jon Keegan4h

WSJ: OpenAI rolling everything into one desktop “superapp”

OpenAI is trying to eliminate distractions and focus on building AI that helps with enterprise productivity tasks like coding and organizing spreadsheets.

As part of that effort, the startup is consolidating some of its “side quests” into one “superapp,” according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.

The plan is to merge ChatGPT, Codex, and the Atlas browser together, as it seeks to focus its efforts as it competes with Anthropic and Google for lucrative enterprise customers.

OpenAI Head of Apps Fidji Simo told staffers in an internal memo that “we realized we were spreading our efforts across too many apps and stacks, and that we need to simplify our efforts. That fragmentation has been slowing us down and making it harder to hit the quality bar we want,” per the report.

Exclusive | OpenAI Plans Launch of Desktop ‘Superapp’ to Refocus, Simplify User Experience

The plan is to merge ChatGPT, Codex, and the Atlas browser together, as it seeks to focus its efforts as it competes with Anthropic and Google for lucrative enterprise customers.

Rani Molla

Semi charmed

What we know about Tesla’s Semi truck as production nears

Musk says “high-volume production” will start this year. Wall Street thinks that’s more like 5,000 to 15,000 trucks.