SpaceX Strikes Deal With Cursor for $60 Billion

SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite company, said on Tuesday that it had struck a deal with the artificial intelligence start-up Cursor that could result in its acquiring the young company for $60 billion.

In a social media post, the rocket maker said the combination with Cursor, which makes code-writing software, would “allow us to build the world’s most useful” A.I. models. SpaceX added that the agreement gave it the option “to acquire Cursor later this year for $60 billion or pay $10 billion for our work together.”

SpaceX is making the deal just as it prepares to go public in what is likely to be one of the largest initial public offerings ever. It is unclear if it plans to consummate a transaction with Cursor before or after its I.P.O., which could happen as early as June.

A code-writing start-up has seemingly little to do with rocket launches and a satellite internet service, which are SpaceX’s main businesses. But Mr. Musk has been increasingly interested in A.I. The tech mogul helped found OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, and in recent years established xAI, which created the Grok chatbot.

Since last year, Mr. Musk has also pushed SpaceX toward A.I. initiatives, including A.I. data centers that would orbit Earth and an A.I. chip factory. In February, SpaceX bought xAI, creating a company that valued itself at $1.25 trillion.

Mr. Musk, 54, has said he sees his goals in space and A.I. as intertwined. In a letter to SpaceX employees announcing the acquisition of xAI, he wrote that humans would become a multiplanetary species only after data centers were deployed in space to better harness the sun’s energy.