On brink of IPO, Musk’s SpaceX already a household name, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds
A Starship rocket at the rocket factory ahead of SpaceX’s initial public offering (IPO), in Starbase, Texas, U.S. May 18, 2026. REUTERS/Gabriel V. Cardenas
Read a summary of this article on FAST.
Get bite-sized news via a new
cards interface. Give it a try.
Click here to return to FAST
Tap here to return to FAST
FAST
WASHINGTON, June 11 : Even before going public, Elon Musk’s SpaceX has become a household name in America — more widely recognized than legacy Apollo-era companies and even prominent 2028 presidential hopefuls, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll.
For the last decade, SpaceX rockets have regularly returned to ocean platforms or giant mechanical arms on the launchpad in controlled landings that resemble science fiction. The company has also disrupted the satellite internet market.
Some 84 per cent of Americans are familiar with the company, according to the six-day Reuters/Ipsos poll that closed on Monday. Just 13 per cent say they have never heard of SpaceX.
That’s on par with Boeing, a 110-year-old company whose planes transport hundreds of millions of passengers annually that 14 per cent of respondents said they had never heard of – and far more than B-2 stealth bomber maker Northrop Grumman, unknown to half the poll respondents.
Guess Word
Crack the word, one row at a time
Buzzword
Create words using the given letters
Mini Sudoku
Tiny puzzle, mighty brain teaser
Mini Crossword
Small grid, big challenge
Word Search
Spot as many words as you can
It also trumped well-known public figures, including Republican Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who one in five respondents had not heard of, and Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom, unknown to one in four respondents. Both are seen as strong contenders for the White House in 2028.
SPACE PROGRAM
America’s storied space program has come to rely heavily on SpaceX, the only U.S. entity capable of sending astronauts to the International Space Station. It’s also building a key astronaut moon lander for NASA, launching most of the Pentagon’s satellites to space, and wooing the U.S. military and intelligence agencies with its vast satellite networks Starlink and Starshield.
SpaceX hopes to cash in on its fame in its stock offering, reportedly reserving up to 30 per cent of the initial stock sales for retail investors — far more than the usual 5 per cent to 10 per cent. The new shares are expected to be priced on Thursday, with the offering potentially valuing the company at well over $1 trillion even though it has recently been losing money.
Some 29 per cent of poll respondents said they would likely buy stock in SpaceX if it were available to them. That doesn’t mean a third of the country will rush out to buy the shares. The Federal Reserve estimates only a fifth of households own any individual stocks directly, and many of those holdings are employer-stock related.
SpaceX is also somewhat polarizing for Americans who associate the company with its CEO, Musk, a billionaire who played a major role in the early months of Republican President Donald Trump’s second term. Some 74 per cent of Republicans in the Reuters/Ipsos poll said they had a favorable view of SpaceX, compared to 32 per cent of Democrats and 49 per cent of Americans overall. Musk’s own favorability rating, at 34 per cent, was a touch below Trump’s own rating.
U.S. space agency NASA had an 80 per cent favorability rating, although respondents were more divided about crewed space exploration, with 38 per cent saying the costs of NASA sending people to space outweigh the benefits and 58 per cent saying the effort is worth it.
Some also have reservations about the commercialization of space, with 33 per cent of poll respondents saying they oppose the goal of several private companies to mine resources on the moon. Another 24 per cent support the idea, which is among SpaceX’s long-term business plans, and 41 per cent said they neither supported nor opposed it.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted online and gathered responses from 4,531 U.S. adults nationwide. Its results had a margin of error of 2 per centage points in either direction.
Source: Reuters
Sign up for our newsletters
Get the CNA app
Stay updated with notifications for breaking news and our best stories
Get WhatsApp alerts
Join our channel for the top reads for the day on your preferred chat app
Get bite-sized news via a new
cards interface. Give it a try.
Click here to return to FAST
Tap here to return to FAST
FAST
About The Author
