According to a Bloomberg report dated May 18, SpaceX secretly submitted IPO documents to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in April this year. The company plans to list on NASDAQ as early as June 12 under the tentative ticker symbol SPCX, aiming to raise up to $75 billion with an estimated valuation ranging from $1.75 trillion to $2 trillion. If successful, this would be the largest IPO in history — more than triple the $22 billion record set by Alibaba in 2014. In February, SpaceX completed its merger with Musk’s xAI.
Just ahead of the IPO, Starship V3 is scheduled to undergo its 12th overall test flight and debut launch on May 19. Bloomberg describes this moment as a critical juncture where SpaceX is “betting everything” — nearly all commitments the company has made to investors hinge on Starship’s timely delivery.
Starship V3 features several major upgrades over its predecessor: a 10% increase in liftoff thrust, a low-Earth-orbit payload capacity rising from 35 tons to over 100 tons, and enhancements to the Super Heavy booster aimed at frequent reuse. Notably, the upper stage now incorporates an in-orbit propellant refueling interface — a prerequisite technology for NASA’s Artemis lunar missions. SpaceX intends to leverage Starship to expand its Starlink satellite network, develop a lunar base, and realize Musk’s vision of deploying over one million AI data-center satellites. Following multiple explosions and redesign efforts, the latest test flight comes roughly seven months after the prior attempt; SpaceX maintains that technical hurdles have been resolved and expresses full confidence in this upcoming launch.