Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, speaks at an employee meeting in the U.S. on the 11th (local time). Screenshot from X
Elon Musk, chief executive of SpaceX, expressed strong confidence in a business vision centered on artificial intelligence before company employees, laying out his own convictions even about Grok, which has been seen as trailing Claude and ChatGPT in technical capability. This column examines SpaceX’s future through Musk’s remarks.
On the 11th local time, SpaceX posted a video on its official X account showing Musk holding an all-hands meeting with employees.
What stood out at the meeting was the new perspective Musk offered on Grok. “We will train Grok on all of SpaceX’s information, and it will learn from you,” Musk told employees, calling them “the parents of the AI.” He explained that “the AI will inherit your thoughts, ideas and beliefs.” The core task for Grok’s success, he argued, is to ensure that AI — as it advances toward artificial general intelligence (AGI) — holds values that benefit humanity.
According to Samsung Securities, Grok 4.6, released on the 12th, is characterized by a focus on long-running agent tasks and the ability to carry out complex interactive and visual projects compared with the previous version. It scored 61 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index (AAII), an overseas benchmark, up 5 points from Grok 4.5 and 23 points from Grok 4.3. Lee Young-jin, an analyst at Samsung Securities, said, “Assessments of its coding performance are mixed, but it has risen to a level that threatens GPT-5.6-Sol,” adding that “this is the moment it fully joins the frontier race alongside Anthropic and OpenAI.”
Along with preaching his philosophy, Musk offered an optimistic outlook on AI. “The future is overwhelmingly the age of AI and robots,” he said, stressing that SpaceX must win in both AI hardware and software. He also projected that AI would account for 99% of the company’s total value within the next four to five years.
SpaceX has aggressively expanded its AI computing infrastructure following its merger with xAI. Musk said the power capacity of its data centers in Memphis and Mississippi currently stands at 1.4 gigawatts (GW) and will grow to more than 2 GW by the end of this year. He set a target of 10 GW by the end of next year.
“Probably, almost certainly, next month, in September, AI revenue will be larger than all of SpaceX’s other business segments combined,” Musk said, projecting that “in the fourth quarter it will greatly exceed revenue from the other segments.” SpaceX’s business is divided into three areas: satellite communications (Starlink), aerospace and AI.
He also redefined the Starlink service from the standpoint of expanding the AI business. “Starlink, too, will expand from a (satellite) internet service into AI infrastructure connecting billions of AI devices, self-driving cars and humanoid robots,” Musk said, forecasting that data traffic generated by AI and robots will far exceed human internet demand over the long term.
Accordingly, SpaceX is accelerating the commercialization of space-based AI data centers. It is aiming for an initial demonstration of orbital AI computing in 2027. Over the long term, Musk believes it is necessary to build large-scale AI computing infrastructure in space using solar energy.