Elon Musk stated that he likes the idea of merging Tesla and SpaceX and that such a merger is under active consideration. He said this during a conversation with financial analysts about SpaceX's quarterly business results on Tuesday. However, he emphasised that the certainty of such a merger should not be assumed.
Musk noted that special committees have been established within both companies to examine this move. These committees have not reached an agreement on the terms of any transaction, and there is no guarantee that they will. Musk added that he is not a member of either committee and describes himself as an "interested party" because he is the chief executive officer of both Tesla and SpaceX. He compared commenting on the possibility of a merger to "dancing on a minefield".
According to him, shareholders would ultimately decide on the merger, and approval would require at least 50 per cent of Tesla's shareholders. Musk described this threshold as a "quite high hurdle". He also reminded that last year, the majority of Tesla investors approved his compensation package worth approximately 1 trillion dollars. Musk stated that there are many reasons in favour of a merger and that much could be gained.
Tesla is valued at approximately 1.5 trillion dollars, while SpaceX is valued at 2 trillion dollars. A merger of the two companies would be one of the largest in history. SpaceX shares rose 8 per cent after regular trading, and Tesla shares rose 2 per cent, after being in slight decline for weeks. Tesla publishes its quarterly results on Wednesday.
SpaceX builds space rockets and Starlink internet satellites, and in recent years has expanded into providing cloud computing capacity for other technology companies such as Anthropic and Google. This business has become the most profitable part of SpaceX, generating 7.5 billion dollars according to the latest quarterly results. Starlink generated revenue of 5.2 billion dollars. SpaceX as a whole is not profitable and has lost 1.1 billion dollars so far this year.
Over the past year, Musk has increasingly placed his companies under common frameworks. Before SpaceX went public earlier this year, he acquired xAI and X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, which Musk owned. The recent launch of Terafab was a joint effort by Tesla and SpaceX in the production of computer chips. On Tuesday, Musk said that a full merger of the two companies would make sense given the work each does around chips, artificial intelligence, software and other areas.
Musk became the world's first "paper" trillionaire following SpaceX's stock market debut earlier this year. SpaceX quickly surpassed Tesla in market value. Tesla is known as an electric car company, and Musk has in recent years shifted resources towards robotics within the company.
