If SpaceX eventually goes public, the long-anticipated initial public offering is expected to be the largest IPO in history, reshaping valuations across the aerospace industry and delivering a rare blockbuster deal for Wall Street. Elon Musk’s space launch company is preparing to go public next year, reportedly targeting a valuation of around $1.5 trillion, potentially surpassing Saudi Aramco’s IPO record set in 2019. The immediate winner is already clear. It’s a close-knit group of private investors, publicly traded space sector peers, and investment banks vying to take SpaceX public. Here’s who can benefit the most. Private Shareholders SpaceX’s IPO will release liquidity to some of the most outspoken and focused backers in the private market. Ron Baron, founder of Baron Capital, said about 25% of his personal investments are related to SpaceX. The company also accounts for about 18% of the Baron Partners Fund, making it one of the fund’s largest holdings. Barron reiterated that SpaceX is still in the early stages of value creation and said he expects the investment to be worth 10 times its current value over the next 10 years. He also vowed to never sell a single SpaceX stock in his lifetime. Cathie Wood also made SpaceX a fundamental bet. The company is ARK’s venture fund’s largest holding, with assets under management of $384 million, accounting for 7.4% of the fund. Wood said ARK’s expected 2030 value to SpaceX will be an enterprise value of about $2.5 trillion, driven by launch services and Starlink’s global expansion. Retail investors are also increasingly seeking indirect exposure. EchoStar is benefiting from a new focus on SpaceX’s significant stake acquired through previous frequency license sales related to satellite and radio assets. Rival rocket company SpaceX’s IPO is likely to serve as a valuation anchor for the entire space and aerospace industry and attract new capital to its publicly traded peers. “Overall, a potential SpaceX IPO would be the largest IPO in history and, in our view, would likely also focus attention on undervalued aerospace valuations,” said Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Andres Shepherd. This dynamic could particularly benefit Rocket Lab, which Shepard views as the closest public market peer to SpaceX’s launch business. Rocket Lab is targeting more than 20 launches in 2025 and has completed a total of 77 successful launches to date, making it the second most active launch provider in the U.S. and the most active publicly traded company in the space, Shepherd said. As space-based data centers gain traction, as highlighted by SpaceX, other companies such as Planet Labs and Intuitive Machines will also benefit, according to Deutsche Bank. Deutsche Bank said Planet Labs is already working with Google to develop a prototype satellite to test features such as in-orbit thermal management, formation flight and edge computing, with a goal of launching in 2027. Intuitive Machines could benefit through Lantelis’ proposed acquisition, which Deutsche Bank said would give the new company access to a satellite platform capable of supporting high-power graphics processing unit and tensor processing unit payloads. Banks Finally, there’s Wall Street. The deal could result in hundreds of millions of dollars in underwriting fees, making it one of the most popular transactions in recent years.
