Elon Musk’s departure from his brainchild, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), may have been controversial as the tech billionaire voiced his concerns over President Donald Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” recently. However, it looks like Musk will have his hands full with shoring up funds for his own companies.
His space exploration company SpaceX suffered its third disastrous launch last week after the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) fast-tracked the launch against prevalent advice. Some suggest that the FAA bending to Musk’s will was a sign of preferential treatment, suggesting that Musk may have greased the wheels for launch clearance. SpaceX must be waiting for Musk to make concrete decisions regarding the future of his company. Not only SpaceX but his other ventures like Tesla and Neuralink may be scrambling for funds too despite their actions being framed as business as usual.
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His neurotech startup Neuralink announced a $650 million funding round, while his electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla in May enjoyed a 213% year-on-year jump in sales in Norway.
Now, this might seem like a fortunate coincidence but it looks like Tesla’s encouraging numbers in Norway are an outlier amid a plunge in Europe sales. Additionally, Starlink’s funding round and Tesla’s increase in Norway sales occurred while Musk still had his hands full with the White House. His absence from his ventures might be a factor for Tesla’s board to have been eager in discussing Musk’s pay package.
However, it seems that both outcomes may fairly or unfairly be attributed to Musk. Despite turmoil, his companies, at least at first glance, look successful. Tesla still has a market capitalization of over $1 trillion, and Musk is seeking a valuation of more than $120 billion for his artificial intelligence startup xAI — by contrast, rivals Perplexity AI and Anthropic are looking for valuations at $14 billion and $61.5 billion, respectively.
As of mid-2025, Musk’s ventures continue to dominate multiple sectors with significant valuations. SpaceX leads with an estimated valuation of $350 billion, driven by rapid Starlink growth and commercial space launches.
Tesla, despite facing a 13% decline in vehicle sales and a 66% drop in operating profit in Q1, holds strong with a stock price around $342 and a market cap exceeding $550 billion, buoyed by its upcoming autonomous robotaxi service.
xAI, Musk’s artificial intelligence company, has quickly risen to a $113 billion valuation, bolstered by its Grok chatbot and the development of a large-scale AI supercomputer cluster. In March, xAI acquired Twitter—now X—in a deal valuing the social media platform at $33 billion, or $45 billion including debt. These figures reflect Musk’s strategy to integrate space, energy, AI, and communications, underscoring his broad influence on the future of technology and infrastructure across industries.