SpaceX plan 2026 IPO: Xplorer founder reacts, talks space economy

SpaceX plan 2026 IPO: Xplorer founder reacts, talks space economy

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Tue, December 9, 2025 at 5:45 PM EST

Elon Musk's SpaceX (SPAX.PVT) reportedly is moving forward with plans to go public via an IPO in 2026, according to Bloomberg.

Xplore Founder and COO Lisa Rich comes on Asking for a Trend to react to this news and further discuss the robustness of the growing space economy

To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Asking for a Trend.

Video Transcript

00:00

Josh

So what can an investor expect on public market exposure for SpaceX? Here to discuss is founder and COO of Explore and founder of Hemisphere Ventures, Lisa Rich.

00:09

Josh

Lisa, it is great to see you. So, uh SpaceX is moving ahead with plans for this IPO.

00:13

Josh

It would seek to raise significantly more than 30 billion. This is according to Bloomberg citing sources, pursuing a listing as soon as mid to late 2026. Uh I'm curious, Lisa, you know, how if this happens, would you expect public market investors to perhaps react and respond to that IPO?

00:26

Josh

And what more broadly, Lisa, would such an IPO maybe signal to you about just the space economy and industry?

00:35

Lisa Rich

Thank you, Josh. Thank you for having me and pleased to comment on this exciting news for SpaceX. Uh, this is a uh continuum of uh capabilities uh with a company that's proven itself to be sustainable, resilient, and reliable, which is what the space industry needs.

00:54

Lisa Rich

Uh launch is a very difficult thing. There have been hundreds of competitors in launch. No one has done what SpaceX has done with the a cadence of launch that companies can rely on. In fact, my own company Explore got to space on a Falcon 9 last December and uh and it was just a phenomenal uh uh launch and everything went uh as planned.

01:21

Lisa Rich

That's what the investors need to know. That's what uh the companies that are their clients that need to launch their high capability hardware and software on satellites need to know.

01:34

Lisa Rich

Um, this is uh as I said, a continuum of capability for SpaceX. Um, launch is first, but with Falcon 9, Starship is coming online and what they're enabling with Starship is phenomenal.

01:51

Lisa Rich

Um, when you go into the the Starship rocket at uh their SpaceX Starbase, uh as I have, you go inside of it and you see the capacity that they can include on a single launch. So what does this do? This reduces the cost of launch, which is really important to uh increase how much we can have, how much mass we can get to space.

02:11

Lisa Rich

and how many companies can benefit from the value of sending satellites to space. So, uh that Pez dispenser that they created where they can just pop off payloads when they get Starship in space. We can't wait to be a part of that.

02:23

Josh

I I'm curious because you've invested in something like 30 plus space companies. So where where are we in sort of the the space economy cycle? You know, early stage versus actual commercialization. Where are we and and where does in your opinion sort of SpaceX fit in there?

02:37

Lisa Rich

Right, because our companies that have exited, um, Voyager most recently, um, they're still early days, right? But uh the space economy is robust and especially with the government support as you've done your shows on showing the importance of the military component for space. Um, there is a lot of work to be done with fueling the AI revolution.

03:07

Lisa Rich

So, as we think about satellites that go to space and what do they do once they get to space. Um, typically it's either coms, communications capabilities, or it's collecting data.

03:22

Lisa Rich

So as my company does, we're collecting data and that data is going to fuel the AI revolution. They need it as it is unattainable otherwise. It is uncorrupt pure scientific, autonomously collected data from satellites that will fuel ML, LLM's, ML's, and the AI applications that all of the AI companies like Pateer, All, etc are working on.

03:47

Josh

How Lisa has the regulatory backdrop evolved for the US space economy over the many years you've been investing here, you know, how has it evolved? Have have you seen by the way, you know, significant changes since Trump took office?

04:01

Lisa Rich

Absolutely. I just got back from DC and was just overjoyed with the appointment of Taylor Jordan to the US Department of Space Commerce. One of the big moves they're making is they're taking the Department of Space Commerce outside of Noah.

04:13

Lisa Rich

out from underneath Noah. And having it as an independent department is really important. So that's happening and Howard Lutnick is uh a great supporter of space as I understand it. So, um, they have some investment that they're going to be making. uh they already have really kind of changed the the parameters around how early stage companies can benefit

04:32

Lisa Rich

uh and have help from the government with the office of strategic capital that uh last year issued uh an opportunity to obtain $900 million in loans for early stage companies that were sending satellites to space.

04:47

Lisa Rich

They expect to expand this, I believe, uh because companies were promised that uh that was just stage one and and we're going to go on from there. So, I'm trusting this administration, especially with its focus on international relationships and

05:01

Lisa Rich

um, making sure that the US has primacy in space that we need to uh work with our allies and we need to enable US commercial companies to strive and thrive. And how do we do that? We do need the government stepping in where when needed, especially for international relationships.

05:20

Lisa Rich

because it can get very complex for uh especially early stage commercial companies. And these are not companies with thousands of employees and a team of lawyers or foreign relations experts or what have you what you need for international. So, um, we need uh resources and the US Commerce Department and their associates like NTIA are looking to help.

05:46

Josh

You know, final question uh Lisa, we we often talk about key man risk when it comes to Musk. You know this, of course. Um and I'm just curious as a SpaceX investor, how you think about that? How you think about Musk's uh centrality to this company?

06:02

Lisa Rich

Well, is there a key woman risk by the way? because I was seeing that Gwen Shotwell twice was selected as like the the award of the year for innovator of the year as like one of the most outstanding operators and executives in the space industry.

06:22

Lisa Rich

So when you think about continuity, you know, you remember we were all worried about Disney when Iger left and you know, what's going to happen or when uh Steve Jobs died. But um in this case, I think you've got other people behind the helm.

06:36

Lisa Rich

I'm very close with some of their um top uh folks that run launch, for example, and have other uh purposes at the company. They have the most stellar team in the world. SpaceX has been able to att attract the top 1% of employees bar none.

06:55

Lisa Rich

I mean, I wish I had their applicants, right? So I'm not worried.

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