SpaceX agrees to buy Cursor for $60 billion

SpaceX has agreed to buy the AI coding start-up behind Cursor for $60 billion in stock, moving deeper into artificial intelligence just days after Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite company completed a blockbuster public listing.

The company said in a securities filing Tuesday that Cursor’s developer, San Francisco-based Anysphere, will become a wholly owned subsidiary when the deal closes. CBS News reported that the closing is expected in the third quarter of 2026, while the BBC reported that SpaceX said the deal would be completed by the end of September. Cursor shareholders are to be paid with $60 billion worth of SpaceX shares, according to the BBC.

Cursor, launched in 2022, makes an AI coding assistant that can automate parts of the software-writing process. On its website, the company describes Cursor as a “coding agent for building ambitious software.” The product has been associated with the rise of “vibe coding,” a term used as AI tools become more capable of generating software with less direct human coding.

SpaceX and Cursor had already been working together. In April, SpaceX said it had the right either to buy Cursor for $60 billion or pay $10 billion for their joint work. At the time, SpaceX said on X that it was working with Cursor to create the “world’s best coding and knowledge work AI.” The BBC quoted SpaceX as saying in April: “The combination of Cursor’s leading product and distribution to expert software engineers with SpaceX’s million H100 equivalent Colossus training supercomputer will allow us to build the world’s most useful models.”

Cursor also said then that teaming with SpaceX subsidiary xAI would allow it to build future software products using xAI’s AI data center complex in Memphis, Tennessee, according to CBS News. SpaceX entered the AI business through this year’s acquisition of xAI, another company Musk owned and operated, the BBC reported. xAI is behind the Grok chatbot.

The acquisition puts SpaceX more directly into competition with AI companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic, both of which have AI coding tools and are expected to go public this year, according to CBS News. “SpaceX hopes the Cursor team/product will give a jolt to its Grok AI business (especially in coding), which has so far failed to make a dent in the frontier market (which is led by Anthropic, OpenAI, Google and Meta in the US, in that order),” Vital Knowledge analyst Adam Crisafulli said in a note to investors Tuesday.

Cursor is used by major companies including Stripe, Adobe and Nvidia, the BBC reported. Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang has described it as his “favourite enterprise AI service.”

The deal follows SpaceX’s initial public offering on Friday. CBS News reported that the company raised $75 billion in the IPO, while the BBC reported that the listing raised $85.7 billion, valued SpaceX at more than $2 trillion and was the biggest ever listing on the Nasdaq. The BBC also reported that the listing made Musk the world’s first trillionaire, prompting debate about inequality and wealth taxes.

SpaceX shares rose 5% in pre-market trading Tuesday to $202.11, according to CBS News. The BBC reported that the stock has climbed almost 50% from its $135 offer price, including a strong first full day of trading.

The BBC reported that SpaceX is not currently profitable and has lost more than $9 billion in 2025 and 2026 so far, according to financial filings, due to heavy spending on AI and other infrastructure investments. Its core business remains manufacturing and launching rockets with reusable parts, as well as building and launching Starlink internet satellites.

SpaceX and Cursor did not immediately respond to requests for comment, CBS News reported.