Tesla and SpaceX, the two companies led by Elon Musk, have each formed special committees of independent directors to examine a possible merger, after Musk said publicly that combining them would be “a good idea.” Reuters reported Musk’s comment and the formation of the committees. The news landed in the same cycle as an October 19, 2026 analysis from ARK Invest, summarised by shattered.io, that ranks satellite internet third among SpaceX’s future revenue engines.
For Starlink customers, nothing changes yet. None of the four reports describes a change to Starlink pricing, a new country on the availability list, or any licensing move. A merger would be a corporate-structure decision taken above the service layer: existing dishes keep working on existing plans, and prospective subscribers in waitlisted markets still depend on national regulators, not on the committees. The one channel through which a deal could eventually reach subscribers is money — whether a combined balance sheet funds more satellite production, and therefore more capacity, than SpaceX can fund alone.
Reported figures
- Musk said both boards formed special committees of independent directors and that he would recuse himself from both, according to Yahoo Finance, which added that Tesla told its own earnings call the merger was off the table.
- SpaceX’s revenue for the first nine months of 2026 nearly doubled to $27.08 billion from $13.7 billion, driven by growth in Starlink and AI, Reuters reported.
- SpaceX swung to a $4.4 billion profit in the third quarter, its first as a public company, but still lost $413 million across the nine months, per Reuters.
- Capital expenditure ran to $48.1 billion over nine months, $19.6 billion of it in the third quarter, mainly on AI compute, Starship infrastructure and satellite production, Reuters reported. Cash burn was $34.97 billion.
- Musk said on Sunday that SpaceX had closed $40 billion in debt financing for graphics processing units, per Reuters.
Projections and odds — not results
The headline numbers circulating with this story are forecasts and market prices, and should not be read next to the quarterly actuals above as if they were the same kind of figure.
- Model: ARK Invest expects Tesla’s cumulative AI infrastructure spending to rise from about $7 billion at the end of 2025 to about $225 billion by the end of 2031, shattered.io reported from ARK’s analysis.
- Market odds: traders on Kalshi price the chance of the two companies combining before the end of 2028 at 77%, according to Financial News.
- Analyst sketch: the structure most analysts have outlined, that outlet reported, is an all-stock deal in which SpaceX buys Tesla at a premium of about 30%, giving Tesla holders roughly 3.16 SpaceX shares each, with combined 2031 revenue of about $1.16 trillion and an implied price near $450 a share. Barclays analyst Dan Levy expects any announcement could come before Tesla’s annual meeting on December 6, 2026.
Where Starlink sits in ARK’s ranking
ARK’s October analysis puts satellite broadband third among three revenue engines: computing on Earth and in space first, robotaxis second, Starlink third. shattered.io stressed that this is a model, not a result, noting ARK’s use of “could” and “potentially,” that no orbital data centre is running and that no robotaxi profit has moved to SpaceX.
That matters because of what the ranking reverses. Of the three engines, satellite internet is the only one already selling a service to paying customers at scale — and it is now the smaller half of SpaceX’s own growth story, since SpaceX’s AI unit overtook Starlink in the latest quarter. Demoting the dish business to third place is a bet that two businesses with no revenue today will outgrow it within five years. shattered.io also said ARK sees Tesla and SpaceX jointly launching Terafab, with Tesla spending roughly $3 billion on its initial research arm — about 1.3% of the $225 billion endpoint, by the outlet’s own arithmetic.
Why the cash burn is the Starlink story
Starlink is now one business line inside a company Reuters describes as spending far more than it brings in, and SpaceX expects fourth-quarter capex of $35 billion to $40 billion. Reuters said analysts believe a Tesla combination could ease pressure on that burn by letting the companies share services and borrow jointly, and noted the heavy spending leaves SpaceX dependent on fresh funding. Satellite production competes for that money with AI compute and Starship — which is why the constellation’s build rate, including Musk’s claim about 100,000 V4 satellites, is the part of the merger debate with a plausible route to the customer experience.
The valuations do not match
The sources disagree on size. Financial News put Tesla at about $358 a share and roughly $1.42 trillion, SpaceX at about $1.82 trillion, and the pair at about $3.2 trillion. Reuters reported Tesla closing at $386.47 for about $1.53 trillion and SpaceX at $159.31 for about $2.16 trillion, a combined $3.5 trillion that would rank fifth among US public companies. Reuters framed the real fight as control rather than price: Tesla shareholders would swap stakes in an independent company, where Musk holds about 20% of the voting power, for shares in a SpaceX that Musk controls, and analysts told Reuters a merger would hand him control of the combined entity.
Context: Tesla’s side of the trade
The assets Tesla would bring are earlier-stage than Starlink’s. Yahoo Finance reported Tesla’s robotaxi service, running on its Full Self-Driving software, operated without an in-car safety supervisor across Austin, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Orlando and Tampa by September 2026, with 1.48 million FSD subscribers; purpose-built Cybercabs joined the Austin fleet on September 3, 2026, though Texas records listed only about 45 of them in a state fleet of roughly 420 vehicles. Musk has called the Optimus humanoid robot the most valuable product ever made while admitting it is the hardest product Tesla has tried to scale.
The caveats the sources themselves flag
Financial News cautioned that regulatory agencies have historically moved slowly on robotaxi rollouts, that large-scale Optimus production is unproven and that Starship remains under active development. shattered.io added that reporting so far describes no settled legal route for moving cash between the two companies. For readers in Africa, meanwhile, practical rollout news continues to come from local channels, such as Paratus launching Starlink enterprise service in Lesotho.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many Starlink subscribers are there?
The most recent count we have carried is 13.6 million, reported in our coverage of SpaceX’s third-quarter results. Neither Reuters’ merger reporting nor ARK Invest’s October model restates a subscriber figure, so that quarterly disclosure remains the reference point.
Does Tesla already own part of SpaceX?
Yes. Reuters reported Tesla bought $2 billion of SpaceX stock during the first nine months of 2026, a financial tie that predates any merger talk. Tesla ended September with $45.4 billion in cash and investments.
How did SpaceX’s stock market listing go?
According to Reuters, SpaceX listed in June at an issue price of $135 a share and raised $86 billion, which Reuters called the largest public offering ever.
![Using Your Own Router with Starlink: Bypass Mode [2026]](https://starlink-news.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/using-your-own-router-with-starlink-bypass-mode-20-f6c09f95-120x86.png)
