Elon Musk Says SPCX Could Reach Up to $1 Trillion ARR By 2027—Gwynne Shotwell Says Starlink Is Contracted for 12,000 Aircraft

Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:SPCX) CEO Elon Musk, during the commercial spaceflight giant’s second-ever earnings call since it went public, predicted that SpaceX could report an Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) exceeding $500 billion by the end of next year. $1 Trillion ARR Goal On Tuesday, during the earnings call, Musk confirmed that SpaceX will attempt to catch the Starship rocket and the booster during the Flight Test 15, which the billionaire said he expects to happen next month. “I’d say it’s more likely than not that this succeeds next flight,” he said. Read Also: SpaceX Launch Creates Stunning ‘Jellyfish’ Over East Coast: Here’s What Happened He also predicted that Starship would fly weekly by the first half of 2027, with SpaceX conducting Starship launches twice every week or “maybe even more frequently than that by the end of next year.” The CEO then also hailed Starlink, saying SpaceX wanted to place 100,000 satellites in orbit. He also touted the company reaching more than 13 gigawatts of compute in 2027. “In a nutshell, what this implies for SpaceX annual recurring revenue by the end of ’27 is somewhere between $500 billion and $1 trillion,” he said. Gwynne Shotwell Touts Starlink’s 12,000 Aircraft Milestone SpaceX’s President Gwynne Shotwell also announced that the Starlink satellite internet service reached a major milestone in the aviation space. “Starlink is now contracted for roughly 12,000 planes, almost a quarter of the available aircraft, and we’re expanding quickly with both new and existing customers,” she said during the earnings call. She added that SpaceX has agreements in place with three out of four major U.S. carriers and that the company had “quadrupled” production. “Our aviation partners report that Starlink has become a key reason customers choose to fly with them,” she said. SpaceX Earnings SpaceX’s earnings remained largely positive as the company reported revenue of $14.58 billion for the third quarter of 2026. The figure exceeded analyst estimates of $12.74 billion. SpaceX also reported earnings of 35 cents per share, which beat Wall Street consensus of 12 cents per share for the quarter. SpaceX’s revenue surged 161% year-over-year (YoY) in the quarter. Elon Musk Weighs in On Merger Talk During the earnings call, CEO Musk weighed in on SpaceX possibly merging with Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA), confirming that committees had been formed at both enterprises to weigh the pros and cons of such a move. He also confirmed that he was not involved with the committees as it would be a conflict of interest, but said that a merger could be a good idea. Meanwhile, investor Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management put the odds of both companies merging at around 95% following SpaceX’s earnings call. Earlier, Gary Black of The Future Fund LLC said that SpaceX could likely offer $420/share in a stock-for-stock deal between the two companies. Price Action: SPCX shares were up 9.32% to $161.56 during overnight trading on Tuesday. Read Also: TSLA Stock Could Surge Nearly 1,100% by 2031, Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest Says: Expects Tesla-SpaceX Merger Within Five Years Check out more of Benzinga’s Future Of Mobility coverage by following this link. Photo courtesy: Samuel Boivin / Shutterstock.com