SpaceX posts first operating profit as public company as AI revenue nearly triples to $7.6 billion—cruising past Starlink

Elon Musk’s SpaceX said Tuesday that third quarter revenue rose 161% to $14.6 billion year-over-year, cruising past the $12.86 billion analysts expected, according to Visible Alpha consensus from S&P Global Market Intelligence.

The company reported net income of $4.4 million, or 35 cents a share compared with a net loss of $541 million in the second quarter and $5.5 billion a year ago.

Operating income rebounded to $2.79 billion, from a loss of $143 million in the second quarter, well above the $2.33 billion analysts expected.

SpaceX’s buzzy AI segment—renamed “Super Intelligence”—which includes computing capacity leased to Claude-maker Anthropic, Google, Grok and X, clocked in with revenue of $7.56 billion, compared to $6.47 billion analysts had expected, and up from $2.56 billion in the second quarter.

SI revenue nearly tripled this quarter.

Connectivity revenue, mostly from Starlink, rose 69% to $5.25 billion, against the $4.92 analyst expected and connectivity operating income nearly doubled to $2.37 billion.

Starlink added 1.6 million consumer subscribers, falling short of the 2.29 million analysts were predicting.

Overall, Space revenues rose 6% to $1.77 billion, above the $1.46 billion expected.

Capital spending came in at $19.6 billion in the quarter, although the release did not include a full-year forecast, which analysts are eagerly waiting on to make projections about the outlook.

SpaceX’s capital investments are expected to nearly triple from about $70 billion this year to $197.4 billion in the 2028 fiscal year, according to figures cited by Melissa Otto, global head of Visible Alpha research at S&P Global.

In a note before third quarter numbers were released, Otto wrote that consensus estimate projections pegged connectivity capex surging from $4.2 billion in fiscal 2025 to $22.8 billion in fiscal 2028.

Alongside it, SpaceX’s debt is expected to rise nearly sevenfold from $50.7 billion in 2025 to $350 billion in 2029, according to Otto.

Earlier this month, SpaceX agreed to buy investment firm Grain Management’s 800 megahertz-band licenses to boost its Starlink Mobile phone service indoors.

The deal with the global investment firm that specializes in digital infrastructure, is subject to FCC approval.