Elon Musk said he likes the idea of merging Tesla with SpaceX in a potential move that would create a roughly $3.5 trillion technology giant combining AI, space exploration and electric vehicle manufacturing.
“Do I think it would be a good idea? Yes,” Musk said of the potential merger during a SpaceX Q3 earnings call on Tuesday.
Musk said that both SpaceX and Tesla have formed special committees of independent directors to discuss the idea at the request of shareholders, though he isn’t able to take part in the discussions due to being a conflicted party.
A merger would bring Tesla into the same corporate group as Grok developer SpaceXAI (formerly xAI) and social media platform X, which SpaceX acquired in February. The talks also come as SpaceX’s AI business became its largest revenue segment in Q3, underscoring how central artificial intelligence has become to Musk’s expanding technology empire.
“There’s a lot to be gained from cooperating on developing superintelligence software, chip design, the Terafab, obviously, robotics, mass to orbit with the Starmind constellation. Connectivity,” said Musk.
However, Musk tempered expectations of whether a merger will ultimately come through.
“Some people out there assume that a SpaceX and Tesla merger is a certainty, and I think that would be overstating it,” he said, adding that the special committees have not reached agreement on terms of any transaction and there is no guarantee that they will.
“At the end of the day, the shareholders have to be supportive of this and particularly on Tesla’s side we’ll need a 50% vote of all shares, not just those who vote, but of all shareholders. And that’s quite a high hurdle to try to achieve.”
SpaceX Q3 earnings show huge AI revenue gains
Musk’s comments followed SpaceX’s third-quarter earnings report, which showed revenue rising 161% year over year to $14.6 billion, driven largely by its “Super Intelligence” AI segment.
SpaceX’s Super Intelligence segment generated $7.6 billion in third-quarter revenue, an 830% increase from a year earlier, making it the company’s largest revenue contributor.
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SpaceX said the growth was driven by the activation of new cloud services agreements, the acquisition of Cursor and increased adoption of its agentic AI model Grok across enterprise and consumers.
Combined Bitcoin holdings would exceed 30,000 BTC
A Tesla–SpaceX merger could also bring two sizable corporate Bitcoin treasuries under one roof. SpaceX reported holding 18,712 Bitcoin as of June 30, while Tesla held 11,509 BTC on the same date, according to their respective quarterly filings.
Based on those disclosures, a combined company would hold 30,221 BTC, which would make it the sixth-largest public Bitcoin treasury company, beating crypto exchange Bullish.
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