SpaceX just acquired xAI (which already owns 𝕏) - Tesla next?

[mitch9]

Tesla is the only company that is public, SpaceX and Xai are private, so the easy part is done, with those 2 being private companies, with Elon owning the bulk of the shares, the private investors probably didn't need much convincing.

As far as Tesla buying that entity, that's going to be more difficult, and Tesla Boomer Mama, believes we will need 1.2B votes to have it go through, assuming of course Elon votes all of his shares, which he will. The combined entity will have a market cap somewhere in the $2.6-2.8B range, TSLA may double in share price, which of course is good for TSLA investors, and the SpaceX/Xai private investors would then have a way to monitize their private investment, or more likely stay for the long term, because this is going to be a wild ride, one way or another..

Most likely The Boring Company and Neuralink stay private for now, until a better time to integrate them into the fold.

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[That Beast Mode]

Currently estimated at $1.25T valuation

 

[YDR37]

Tesla is the only company that is public, SpaceX and Xai are private, so the easy part is done, with those 2 being private companies, with Elon owning the bulk of the shares, the private investors probably didn't need much convincing.

As far as Tesla buying that entity, that's going to be more difficult

Seems like there could also be ITAR issues with a Tesla/SpaceX merger, unless there maybe is some kind of very, very thick firewall between the two companies. If you look at any SpaceX job posting -- even this one for a barista -- it includes the following:

ITAR REQUIREMENTS

To conform to U.S. Government export regulations, applicant must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (aka green card holder), (iii) Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or (iv) Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.

ITAR = International Traffic in Arms Regulations. Basically the federal government says that SpaceX works on sensitive defense-related technology, and only US citizens and approved Permanent Residents can work there. Elon has explicitly acknowledged these hiring restrictions.

Tesla, on the other hand, is not subject to ITAR and routinely hires non-US citizens; they probably have tens of thousands of non-US employees, especially in China. And some of those foreign nationals have high-ranking positions; for example, Tom Zhu is usually regarded as the #2 guy at Tesla, after Elon. Zhu is from China and has zero US legal status. It's OK for Zhu or other foreign nationals to hold key positions at Tesla, but if there is a merger, then DoD is going to want very strong assurances that they have no access whatsoever to SpaceX technology.

Alternatively, Tesla could maybe spin off the foreign EV operations before a merger. That would greatly alleviate the issue of non-US employees, since most of them are probably associated with car production at the M3/MY factories in Shanghai and Berlin. However, this would make it a lot harder for Elon to reach his goal of "20 million Teslas on the road by 2035"

 

[mitch9]

Seems like there could also be ITAR issues with a Tesla/SpaceX merger, unless there maybe is some kind of very, very thick firewall between the two companies. If you look at any SpaceX job posting -- even this one for a barista -- it includes the following:

ITAR = International Traffic in Arms Regulations. Basically the government says that SpaceX works on sensitive defense technology, and only US citizens and approved Permanent Residents can work there.

Tesla is not subject to ITAR and routinely hires non-US citizens; they probably have tens of thousands of non-US employees, especially from China. For example, Tom Zhu is usually regarded as the #2 guy at Tesla, after Elon. Zhu is from China and has zero US legal status. It's OK for Zhu or other foreign nationals to hold important positions at Tesla, but DoD is not going to allow them to have the same access to SpaceX.

[/QUOTE]

Luckily we have an "Elon" friendly U.S. President for another 2 years.

Tesla and SpaceX, if merged still have seperate workforces, and seperate buildings/locations.

they will colaborate more closely, but they will likely keep most employee's in their current positions, I doubt a non-US Tesla employee is suddenly going to be working over at SpaceX.

The bigger issue could be the Justice Department. Their was another company called "Standard Oil", owned by another billionaire, back then.. who they broke up.

 

[CT_AZ_4x4]

[QUOTE="Fugue, post: 30753411, member:

“The best part is no part.”
[/QUOTE]
Please explain this to me like I’m 5.

 

[Fugue]

Please explain this to me like I’m 5.

Parts can break. If you design things with fewer parts, they're less likely to break.

So instead of having four companies that do some of the same things, just have one.

 

[REM]

Please please Tesla, take both public by acquiring SpaceX and X.ai!!

eww, no. needs to be the other way around. Tesla needs to be absorbed into X and Elon needs to retain absolute control over all of it.

 

[Cincycyber]

eww, no. needs to be the other way around. Tesla needs to be absorbed into X and Elon needs to retain absolute control over all of it.

That's fair. I am selfishly rooting for my Tesla shares. To the moon!

 

[tbuck]

I think many people are missing the underlying challenges that led to this consolidation.

XAI acquired X when X ran out of money.

SpaceX acquired XAI when XAI ran out of money.

Yes, this will increase the valuation of SpaceX prior to an IPO. However, it also increases the financial risk and exposure as both X and XAI were losing billions.

While Elon may have saved himself from losing billions more, it may become a negative drag on SpaceX prior to those companies surviving until they find a way to have positive cash flow.

 

[PungoteagueDave]

I think many people are missing the underlying challenges that led to this consolidation.

XAI acquired X when X ran out of money.

SpaceX acquired XAI when XAI ran out of money.

Yes, this will increase the valuation of SpaceX prior to an IPO. However, it also increases the financial risk and exposure as both X and XAI were losing billions.

While Elon may have saved himself from losing billions more, it may become a negative drag on SpaceX prior to those companies surviving until they find a way to have positive cash flow.

I agree with your risk assessment but point out that SpaceX had $8 billion of net cash flow in '25 on 16-17 billion in revenues, and X turned the corner, going cash flow positive by the end of last year despite reduced revenues, on cost controls and increased ad revenues, and is expected to return to pre-purchase profitability levels in '26. AI is another story, but at least theoretically integral to, and compatible for cross-development on all of the Musk-related platforms, to which I would add in Neuralink, which has a roughly $8 billion in value and benefits from tech sharing. With Optimus on the horizon, putting all of this together has some logic, albeit with silos so each project retains focus. With solar & power delivery inside TSLA, it seems to me that the lines are increasingly blurred and the idea that Tesla is mostly an auto manufacturer is over except in public perception.

 

[Speedr]

As someone who uses AI and have been on this journey for over 8 years (even before Tesla ownership...barely), I can personally tell you that xAI will NOT be a burden to SpaceX. It will be an asset!

AI is exactly what Elon has described it as: a hypersonic tsunami.

There was a step change in December 2025 with the release of Claude Code Opus 4.5. that was followed up OpenAI's Codex, Anthorpic's Claude Cowork, ClaudeBox/OpenClaw, etc. Even Andrej Karpathy, who had been skeptical, converted to a believer. Also, to state the obvous, FSD as well!

Adoption is through the roof, and accelerating everyday. CapEx this year on AI infrastructure will be 2% of US GDP! That blows away the Manhattan Project and Apollo as well (they were 0.4% each).

5 states have already banned/put a moratorium on AI data center build outs to prevent electricity price increases.

So demand is increasing as supply is desperately trying to keep up. And the AI that is out there now is the worst it'll ever be.

 

[PungoteagueDave]

[QUOTE="Fugue, post: 30753411, member:

“The best part is no part.”

Please explain this to me like I’m 5.
[/QUOTE]
That’s a Musk quote. He is relentless in driving engineers to reduce complexity and eliminate parts that conventional thinking has deemed necessary. There are thousands of examples but the most obvious is the fact that no Tesla has a start button, and HVAC controls only on a touch screen. What this means for his entities is dramatic cost reductions and higher margins. My favorite example is the Raptor engine, where weight was reduced 36% while thrust was increased 50% over three successive versions. The number of parts was halved.

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