Elon Musk's path to the first trillionaire: personal sacrifices and space ambitions on the verge of IPO

By March 2026, SpaceX stands on the brink of the largest IPO in human history. Valued at $1.5 trillion, it reveals not only technical achievements but, above all, Elon Musk’s personal journey full of failures, despair, and sacrifices, in which his wife was both support and victim of being drawn into the first phase of the space upheaval.

From PayPal millionaire to confidant of the Martian dream

When Elon Musk cashed out over $100 million from PayPal in 2001, all doors were open. It could have been like for Marc Andreessen—moving into venture capital, becoming an Angel investor, or enjoying a comfortable retirement in Silicon Valley. But Musk chose a raft over a managerial suit: he decided to build rockets.

This wasn’t a capricious decision of a wealthy technologist. It was an obsession supported by cold calculation. In 2001, Musk analyzed every line of rocket construction costs—just as an engineer looking at a spreadsheet would. He discovered that the space industry inflated prices fiftyfold over the actual cost of materials. His wife, whom he married amid optimism after PayPal’s success, couldn’t know that instead of building a normal life, she would soon be pulled into the greatest technical adventure of our times.

Together with two friends, Musk flew to Russia to buy a refurbished Dnepr rocket as a starting point. He was humiliated—engineers from the Lavochkin Design Bureau spat on him, thinking he was an ignorant fool. On the flight home, his companions were depressed, but Musk sat at his computer. After a moment, he showed them a spreadsheet: “I think we can do this ourselves.”

That decision determined the future. SpaceX was founded in February 2002 in a leased hangar in El Segundo. Musk faced years of countless failures, explosions, and sleepless nights. His wife, swept up by the winds of technological change, would have to wait for a man overwhelmed by responsibilities.

Monstrous darkness before the light: when everything fell apart

2008 was a black year for Musk. The third attempt of Falcon 1 ended in disaster—first and second stages collided over the Pacific. Money was running out. Tesla was on the brink of bankruptcy. The financial crisis engulfed the world. And finally—his wife left him after ten years of marriage.

These weren’t just numbers in financial reports. It was the helplessness of a man risking everything and losing. SpaceX engineers didn’t sleep. Suppliers demanded cash. Media, which had previously mocked SpaceX, now ridiculed it.

Worse was that his childhood idols—Neil Armstrong and Gene Cernan—publicly expressed doubts about his project. Armstrong bluntly said, “You don’t understand what you don’t know.” Years later, Musk cried in front of the camera recalling those moments. He didn’t cry when rockets exploded. He didn’t cry when Tesla was close to bankruptcy. But when he remembered the mockery of his heroes, he broke down.

SpaceX had money only for one last launch.

The fourth chance and emerging from darkness

On September 28, 2008, the control center was deathly silent. Everyone knew that if this Falcon 1 didn’t reach orbit, SpaceX would cease to exist, and Musk would lose everything.

The rocket launched. After 25 seconds of flight, previous attempts ended in explosion. This time, it didn’t. After nine minutes, the engine shut down as planned. The payload entered orbit.

There was no triumph in the control room—only relief. Applause and tears. Kimbal, Musk’s brother, couldn’t hold back tears. It was a return from the brink of death.

On December 22 of the same year—just a day before Christmas—William Gerstenmaier from NASA called with a contract worth $1.6 billion. Musk changed his computer password to “ilovenasa.”

SpaceX survived. But the price was high—his wife no longer waited for him at home.

The obsession with reusability: the first principles approach

When SpaceX engineers were satisfied with the Falcon 1 launch, Musk was already thinking of the next madness: rockets must be reusable. Almost everyone opposed it. It was madness.

But Musk returned to first principles. If airplanes are discarded after each flight, no one would fly. If rockets were single-use, space would always be a game for governments and trillions.

This logic pushed him further. In 2015—seven years after his personal disaster—Falcon 9 achieved what was thought impossible. The first stage didn’t explode or sink. It landed vertically on a platform in Florida, just like in science fiction movies.

The era of cheap spaceflight began.

Stainless steel instead of carbon fiber dreams

While SpaceX was working on Starship to colonize Mars, all experts shouted: advanced carbon fibers are needed. Expensive, complicated, but lightweight.

Musk calculated: carbon fiber costs $135 per kilogram, stainless steel $3. Yes, steel is heavy. But its melting point is 1400°C. Carbon fiber can’t withstand high temperatures—it needs to be insulated with fragile, costly thermal protection. Together with the insulation system, a rocket made of ordinary steel weighs the same but costs 40 times less.

This decision completely freed SpaceX. They no longer needed sterile laboratories. They could build rockets on the Texas desert like water towers—if it explodes, clean up and weld again tomorrow.

Building world-class engineering from cheap materials—that was the real revolutionary competitive advantage.

Starlink: from spectacle to infrastructure

For years, SpaceX was just a spectacular clip for the average person—sometimes an explosion, sometimes a rocket landing. Starlink changed everything.

A constellation of thousands of satellites in low orbit became the world’s largest internet provider. Space transformed from spectacle to infrastructure comparable to water or electricity. A receiver the size of a pizza box, and you have access from the ocean or war-torn ruins.

By November 2025, Starlink had 7.65 million active subscribers. Actual users exceeded 24.5 million. It was Starlink that created repeatable revenue—that’s why Wall Street dared to value SpaceX at $800 billion.

Projected revenue for SpaceX in 2025 is $15 billion. In 2026, it will reach $22–24 billion, with over 80% from Starlink. SpaceX is no longer just a contractor—it’s a global telecommunications giant.

The first person to a billion: the last tanker

If SpaceX raises $30 billion from an IPO, it will beat even Saudi Aramco’s 2019 record ($29 billion). The final valuation could reach $1.5 trillion—just behind Saudi Aramco ($1.7 trillion).

For Musk’s factory workers, this news is staggering. Engineers who slept on workshop floors and survived the hell of production will become millionaires or billionaires.

But for Musk himself, the IPO isn’t a profit exit. It’s fueling. Three years ago, at a 2022 conference, he said outright: “Going public is an invitation to suffering, and the stock price disperses.”

What has changed? The ambitions are bigger than mere wealth. Musk’s schedule looks like this: within two years, the first autonomous Starship on Mars; in four years, humans will set foot on the red planet. His ultimate vision—self-sustaining city on Mars within twenty years, built with 1,000 Starship ships.

This requires astronomical sums. Hundreds of billions from the IPO are not for yachts or residences. It’s fuel, steel, oxygen—an infrastructure road to another world.

Just as his wife might not have understood in 2001, when Musk sat at his computer and said, “I think we can do this ourselves”—today, the world waits to see if the man who died a million times in failures will truly complete this cosmic odyssey.

The biggest IPO in history will thus be not just a triumph of one man but a confirmation that obsession can surpass every human hope and suffering.