SpaceX CFO: vertical integration is core, Starship paves way for orbital compute
elonmusk · x · 2026-09-11
Elon Musk shared a Grok Bot summary of SpaceX CFO Bret Johnsen's talk at Goldman Sachs Communacopia:
- Vertical integration is the core operating model: rockets built in-house from metal to software; Starlink owns launch, satellites, and the end customer; on AI, SpaceX builds its own facilities and power, runs its own models, sells to consumer and enterprise — with "orbital compute" coming next.
- Starship underpins everything: Flight 13 delivered demo V3 payloads, relit a Raptor engine, and achieved a soft, precise second-stage splashdown; the recovery team towed the stage back so engineers could study the heat shield.
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