The company plans to build factories on the moon, using robots to do much of the heavy lifting, Elon Musk said on Tuesday (Aug. 4) during SpaceX's first-ever quarterly earnings call.

"We are going to land a lot of tonnage on the moon," he said. "We're going to build the factories on the moon. The robots will be helpful with that."

This is not a newly revealed vision; Musk first laid it out in February, in a blog post that announced SpaceX's purchase of xAI, a company that the billionaire entrepreneur founded in 2023. But Musk doubled down on it this week, showing investors that off-Earth manufacturing is very much front-of-mind for SpaceX.

The factories in question will build SpaceX's Starmind AI satellites, if all goes according to plan. The company aims to operate a million-strong Starmind constellation in Earth orbit in the coming years, and then go farther afield with the craft after that.

Eventually, SpaceX wants to launch locally made Starmind satellites off the lunar surface using electromagnetic mass drivers — basically, extremely powerful rail guns.

"Using robots on the moon to scale up manufacturing on the moon — which, I know it sounds, like, super sci-fi right now, but it's going to happen — will enable us to build the mass accelerator on the moon," Musk said.

"And if you have a mass accelerator on the moon, and you have solar and radiator production on the moon, you can — I know this sounds totally nuts — but you can you can probably scale to 1,000 times the economy of Earth in terms of intelligence launched to space, but probably, you know, maybe even a million times," he added.

"Solar and radiator production" refers to the manufacture of key Starmind satellite components: solar panels to power them and radiators to dump the large amounts of heat they'll produce into the vacuum of space.

Musk didn't provide details about the robotic lunar labor force. But he's presumably counting on Optimus, a humanoid robot built by another one of his companies, the carmaker Tesla. Musk has previously said that SpaceX will launch some Optimus units to Mars in the near future, to help pave the way for human settlement of the Red Planet.

Those robots will fly on Starship, SpaceX's fully reusable next-gen megarocket, which is currently gearing up for its 14th test flight. Indeed, Starship is key to most of the company's plan's both in Earth orbit and beyond.

"Starship aims to quadruple payload capacity and reduce launch costs by 10 times compared to our Falcon 9 rocket, unlocking significant capabilities across all of our business segments," SpaceX Chief Financial Officer Bret Johnsen said during Tuesday's earnings call.

"We continue to make progress building the infrastructure required to support thousands of Starship launches per year, including accelerating Raptor and launch vehicle production, the buildout of our gigabays, and making significant progress towards activating multiple launch pads at Starbase and in Cape Canaveral at Pad 39A and Pad 37," he added. (Raptor is the engine that powers Starship, and Starbase is SpaceX's South Texas site, which serves as the current hub of Starship manufacturing, testing and launch activities.)

Tuesday's call was a landmark for SpaceX — its first as a publicly traded company. Musk founded SpaceX as a private concern in March 2022 and took it public this past June, via the richest IPO in history.

The IPO raised $86 billion and valued SpaceX at $1.77 trillion. Only six American companies had higher market capitalizations at the time — NVIDIA, Apple, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Amazon and the semiconductor manufacturer Broadcom. (Market caps fluctuate all the time, going up and down with companies' stock prices.)

The main point of Tuesday's call was to discuss SpaceX's first-ever earnings report, which covered the second quarter of this year. The company's revenue over that stretch was $7.8 billion, a 92% increase over the same period in 2025, according to the report. SpaceX lost more money than it made during Q2 2026, but the shortfall was considerably smaller than in Q2 2025 — $541 million versus $1.0 billion.

The company aims to launch the 14th test flight of its Starship megarocket before August is out, Elon Musk said today (Aug. 4) during SpaceX's first-ever quarterly earnings call. Starship will deploy viable payloads into orbit on Flight 14, something it has never done before — and there will be other unprecedented action as well.

"I'd say things look very good, and that's why we, assuming we receive regulatory approval to do so, will attempt to catch the Ship with the tower on the next flight, which is tentatively scheduled for the end of this month," Musk said during today's call.

"Ship" is the 171-foot-tall (52 meters) upper stage of Starship, which also features a giant first-stage booster called Super Heavy. Both of these elements are designed to be fully and rapidly reusable — a breakthrough that, combined with Starship's immense power, will revolutionize spaceflight, according to SpaceX.

And "things look very good" is a reference to Starship Flight 13, which lifted off on July 24. Musk was talking specifically about Ship's performance on that suborbital jaunt, which ended with the upper stage's soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Western Australia.

Ship's heat shield survived the harrowing downward trip through Earth's atmosphere in great shape on Flight 13, according to SpaceX (as did the entire vehicle, which is still in one piece to this day). And that gives SpaceX confidence to plan for a tower catch on Flight 14 — a crucial component of Starship's future reusability.

"I don't want to jinx it or anything, but I think I'd consider the heat shield problem solved at this point," Musk said.

Starship's two launch towers at its Starbase site in South Texas feature large "chopstick" arms, which stack Super Heavy and Ship atop the pad — and can also catch the vehicles when they come back to Earth at the end of their missions.

SpaceX has already executed a tower catch with Super Heavy on three Starship test flights, but it has not yet tried to do so with Ship. So Flight 14 could be momentous, provided SpaceX gets permission from regulators to make an attempt.

Flight 14 will also carry up a batch of SpaceX's V3 Starlink satellites, a larger and more capable version of the spacecraft that currently populate the company's broadband megaconstellation. Flight 13 toted 20 Starlink V3s, but Ship deployed them into suborbital space; the satellites will be placed into an operational orbit on the upcoming mission, if all goes to plan, Musk said.

SpaceX goes public

Musk founded SpaceX as a private company back in March 2002. It stayed that way until this past June 12, when SpaceX went public via the richest IPO in history, which raised $86 billion and valued the company at $1.77 trillion.

SpaceX now has to provide earnings reports every quarter, starting with Q2 of this year. And these first publicized numbers show considerable improvement compared to a year ago, according to the company.

The newly released report states that total revenue in the March-June time period was up 92% over the same stretch in 2025 — $7.8 billion versus $4.1 billion. And SpaceX had a net loss during this span of $541 million, down from a net loss of $1.0 billion in Q2 2025.

More than half of this quarter's revenue — about $4.3 billion — came via the company's Starlink satellite-internet megaconstellation. That number crystallizes a truth that has been apparent for a while now — SpaceX is not just a launch company anymore.

Rockets will bring in a smaller and smaller share of SpaceX revenue over the coming years, if all goes according to plan. Launch will continue ceding this financial ground to Starlink, but also, increasingly, to SpaceX's artificial intelligence (AI) operations.

Indeed, SpaceX sees itself becoming more and more of an AI outfit over time. A few months ago, the company revealed that, over the long haul, it's targeting a "total addressable market" of $28.5 trillion per year, nearly $23 trillion of which will be in the field of "enterprise AI applications." That's quite an ambitious goal; in 2025, the gross domestic product of the entire United States was a little less than $31 trillion.

Speaking of ambitious: SpaceX plans to make a lot of this money via an orbiting constellation of one million AI data centers, which together will comprise a constellation known as Starmind. (Yes, SpaceX has a thing for "Star" names.)

SpaceX expects to start launching operational Starmind spacecraft in 2027, Musk said during today's call. It will take a lot of Starship launches to get the network up and running, but he doesn't see that as a bottleneck.

"We expect the cadence of flights to be increasing rapidly, and, probably a year from now, we will be doing at least one flight a day, possibly more," Musk said.

For better or for worse, the world has its first trillionaire: Elon Musk.

On Friday (June 12), Musk's rocket company SpaceX made its debut on the Nasdaq, marking the largest IPO in history. With a staggering $1.78 trillion dollar valuation, it made Musk the first-ever trillionaire during the first 20 minutes or so of trading.

And to mark the occasion, SpaceX's giant Starship rocket was broadcast on the side of a skyscraper in New York City. On another skyscraper just to the left, Musk himself was featured.

What is it?

SpaceX's tremendous IPO started trading at around $150 a share on opening day, ultimately closing that same day at $160.95 a share. It has since been a big topic of discussion among financial experts and amateur traders alike.

The 19.2% gain that SpaceX's stock (trading under the ticker symbol SPCX) experienced on opening day took the company to a $2.1 trillion market capitalization, according to Yahoo Finance.

SpaceX, however, isn't alone in getting past a trillion in market cap this year. Also according to Yahoo Finance, Walmart (WMT) did the same on Feb. 3, as did Micron Technology (MU) on May 26. Meanwhile, Apple (AAPL) was the first company ever to top a trillion in market cap, doing so in August of 2018.

Still, Musk is the first person to have a net worth above a trillion (though, to be clear, most of that money remains in his stock holdings).

Why is it noteworthy?

It's fitting that Starship was the chosen vehicle to be broadcast in celebration of the SpaceX IPO instead of, perhaps, the company's workhorse Falcon 9 rocket, which has sent astronauts to the International Space Station time and again.

Starship is analogous to the larger-than-life dreams of Musk, and it's key to SpaceX's future. Unlike the tried-and-trusted Falcon 9, the 408-foot-tall (124 meters) Starship is still in development. It's being built to bring humans to the moon — no, the pun isn't lost on me — and Mars someday. Settling Mars has been a longtime goal of Musk, with the entrepreneur even suggesting he'd like to die on the Red Planet one day.

SpaceX has been continually building and flying iterations of Starship while unafraid of failure, in keeping with the company's philosophy. The idea is to find and fix issues via flight testing, a strategy that SpaceX thinks works well over the long haul. This method has led to some stunning images and also some environmental hazards. To illustrate his grandiose thinking, a few years ago, Musk said he hopes to send fleets of 1,000 Starships to Mars every 26 months. More recently, he said he hopes to put up to one million AI satellites in Earth orbit.

"It is certainly hard to believe that a little company that started in a warehouse in El Segundo is now going public with the largest IPO ever," Musk said during an opening ceremony broadcast by Nasdaq on the day of the IPO. "I gave SpaceX less than a 10% chance of succeeding at all, to be clear."

The company revealed this week that it plans to sell shares at $135 apiece during the IPO, which will occur June 12 when SpaceX begins trading on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol SPCX.

That share price would give the company a valuation of $1.77 trillion, according to CNBC. Just six American companies are worth more: NVIDIA, Apple, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Amazon and semiconductor manufacturer Broadcom.

SpaceX aims to sell 555.6 million shares during the IPO, raising a total of $75 billion, CNBC reported. That would smash the IPO fundraise record of $21.8 billion, which was set back in 2014 by Chinese tech giant Alibaba.

The cash infusion will help SpaceX reach truly unprecedented heights, if all goes according to plan.

Elon Musk's company already dominates the global launch market, lofting 85% of all the satellites that went up in 2025. Most of those spacecraft were its own Starlink broadband craft, which constitute more than 75% of all active satellites in Earth orbit.

But the company is diversifying beyond launch and telecommunications — specifically, into artificial intelligence. SpaceX recently acquired xAI, the startup that Musk founded in 2023. xAI owns X (the social media platform formerly known as Twitter), built the generative AI chatbot Grok and operates Colossus, a supercomputer cluster in Tennessee.

And SpaceX intends to take AI into the final frontier: It plans to operate one million off-Earth AI data centers, which the company will launch aboard its Starship megarocket.

Starship is the biggest and most powerful rocket ever built, and it's designed to be fully and rapidly reusable — a combination that will be revolutionary, according to Musk. But the vehicle remains in the development phase; it flew its 12th-ever test flight (like all the others, a suborbital affair) on May 22.

The company's ambitions are obviously quite lofty — but SpaceX is dreaming even bigger than you probably think. According to paperwork that SpaceX filed ahead of its IPO, it's eyeing a "total addressable market" (TAM) over the long haul of $28.5 trillion.

For perspective: In 2025, the gross domestic product of the United States — the total value of all goods and services generated within the nation's borders — was about $30.8 trillion.

The vast majority of SpaceX's envisioned TAM — nearly $23 trillion — is in the area of "enterprise AI applications," according to a video the company released as part of its IPO package. The company thinks that target is attainable because of its launch dominance, among other factors.

"Why do we think we're going to win? I think it starts first and foremost with our global leadership position in orbital launch services," Bret Johnsen, SpaceX's longtime chief financial officer, says in the video.

"We have an unrivaled satellite and connectivity platform that really leverages vertical integration from design, manufacturing, deployment and operations, and now really truth-seeking AI models enhanced by real-time data from our X platform," he added. "That extreme vertical integration really enables high-velocity and superior cost efficiency at scale. And, really, the business models are incredibly difficult to replicate, because of the fact that, at the core, you first have to have that global leadership position in orbital launch."

An IPO signals that a private company is now selling shares to the public on a stock exchange. SpaceX's long-anticipated move could become the largest IPO in history, perhaps giving a $2 trillion dollar valuation to the company, which will soon be listed on the ticker as SPCX.

SpaceX's SEC Form S-1 is a vital registration step for U.S.-based companies planning an IPO, detailing significant corporate information to assist investors.

"This prospectus contains forward-looking statements that are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond our control," SpaceX wrote in the S-1. "You should read this entire prospectus carefully before making an investment decision."

The prospectus adds: "We face a number of challenges relating to our business and growth strategy and, ultimately, the achievement of our mission to make life multiplanetary, understand the true nature of the universe, and extend the light of consciousness to the stars."

Space.com reached out to a number of experts about what the SpaceX IPO means for markets and individual investors — and the implications for a new wave of high-tech listings seeking fame and fortune.

The Elon factor

Shaun Davies is an associate professor of finance at the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado Boulder. He told Space.com that people should view this as much bigger than just "another IPO."

"This could be one of the largest IPOs in history, both from a valuation perspective and from the sheer amount of attention it will attract," Davies said. "Everyone will be watching because of the Elon factor … Love him or hate him, you know who he is."

What makes it unique is that SpaceX is no longer just a rocket company, Davies said. "When people hear 'SpaceX,' they think rockets, NASA partnerships, and commercial space travel. That is certainly part of the story," he said.

But this is also tied to the company's Starlink internet megaconstellation and increasingly to xAI, a division of SpaceX, and the broader artificial intelligence (AI) arms race that is playing out right now, said Davies.

Similar in view is Ann Lipton, a professor and the Laurence W. DeMuth Chair at the University of Colorado Boulder's School of Law.

Lipton said the hype surrounding the IPO "does seem to have piqued investor interest in space stocks more generally. But it's true that the financials being disclosed suggest that SpaceX's profitability is being used to finance artificial intelligence development."

New opportunities

First of all, congratulations should go to Elon Musk and the team at SpaceX that made the IPO possible, said Scott Pace, director of the Space Policy Institute and a professor of the practice of international affairs at George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs.

"Secondly, I believe fundamental drivers of growth will be information technologies that integrate communications, data and artificial intelligence using space in new ways," said Pace.

"The iconic rocket launches and landings that the public sees have just opened the door to new opportunities," he added.

Almost irrational exuberance

"No commercial space firm has had a greater impact on private investor interest than SpaceX," said Scott Sacknoff, manager of the SPADE Defense Index, which develops and manages sector, thematic and regional equity indexes that can be used to benchmark markets.

"Its forthcoming IPO has seen mainstream investor enthusiasm ramp up to a level of almost irrational exuberance," said Sacknoff. "Investment capital is flowing into the sector at unprecedented levels, and publicly traded space companies have seen stock prices rise 60-100% this year."

What will happen following the IPO is unclear, Sacknoff said, as capital is likely to shift from other firms as investors buy shares in SpaceX. "At a $1.75 trillion valuation, investors that make money will likely be traders, not buy-and-hold investors," he said.

SpaceX is now not a launch company, Sacknoff added: "It is a conglomerate with exposure to AI, advertising, communications and space manufacturing and operations." A rumored merger with Tesla, he said, will only diversify the firm further into automobiles, power storage and more.

Not just a rockets story

"There are a lot of moving pieces here," Davies emphasized. "It is aerospace, communications infrastructure, defense technology and AI all wrapped into one company. That is part of why investors are so fascinated by it."

"This is not just a rockets story anymore," he continued. A successful SpaceX IPO would return a tremendous amount of capital back to investors and could help open more opportunities for the broader IPO market for other companies that have been waiting on the sidelines, Davies said.

On the other hand, he added, if a deal this large struggles, "it could effectively shut down the IPO market for a while, particularly for speculative growth companies that have been waiting on the sidelines."

That is why so many people will be watching this closely.

"In many ways, SpaceX could become the bellwether for the next phase of the IPO market," Davies concluded.

Elon Musk's company has been private since its founding in March 2002. Over the past six days, however, speculation has swirled that SpaceX will hold an initial public offering (IPO) next year, offering investors the chance to buy shares for the first time.

The Wall Street Journal and The Information first reported this plan last Friday (Dec. 5), and other outlets soon followed up. For example, a Bloomberg story on Tuesday (Dec. 9) suggested that SpaceX will seek a valuation of $1.5 trillion, which would make it one of the most valuable publicly traded companies in the world. The IPO, which is apparently targeted for mid- to late 2026, could raise a record $30 billion or more.

On Wednesday (Dec. 10), Ars Technica's Eric Berger posted a story confirming the IPO rumors and offering an explanation for the move: SpaceX wants to raise money to pay for the buildout of data centers in space, which Musk and a growing number of people believe will be a key enabler of the coming AI revolution.

"Foremost among Musk's goals right now is to 'win' the battle for artificial intelligence. He is already attacking the problem at xAI and Tesla, and he now seeks to throw SpaceX into the fray as well," Berger wrote. "Taking SpaceX public and using it to marshal an incredible amount of resources shows he is playing to win."

SpaceX's initial off-Earth data centers will be modified versions of the company's Starlink broadband satellites, according to Berger, who has written two books about SpaceX. But the company's long-term vision involves setting up AI-satellite factories on the moon and launching them into space using railguns, he added, citing a Dec. 7 X post by Musk.

Berger's sources are apparently reliable, for Musk backed the piece in a Wednesday X post. "As usual, Eric is accurate," the billionaire wrote.

The IPO news has stirred concern among some space fans, who worry that a publicly traded SpaceX won't be as free to pursue its Mars-settlement plans, which hinge on the development and operation of the company's giant, fully reusable Starship rocket. After all, establishing a city on Mars will be extremely expensive, with little financial return in the short term — not exactly the mission profile that most investors are keen to support.

However, Berger thinks Musk views the IPO as a way to help fund Mars settlement, which the billionaire has long stressed is his overarching goal and the reason he founded SpaceX in the first place.

"Musk has frequently expressed a concern that there may be a limited window for settling Mars," Berger wrote. "Perhaps financial markets collapse. Perhaps there’s a worse pandemic. Perhaps a large asteroid hits the planet. Taking SpaceX public now is a bet that he can marshal the resources now, during his lifetime, to make Mars City One a reality. He is 54 years old."

As was madeclear in GeoEye's May 9 conference call, investors remain uncertain how to readthe buying habits of the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA),which is by far the biggest customer for both GeoEye and DigitalGlobe andlikely to remain so for some time.

Investorblogs posted since GeoEye's first-quarter earnings release and conference call,which resulted in a sharp drop in a stock that had been a star performer in2007, underscore the fact that GeoEye investors cannot determine whetherreduced NGA revenues are due to GeoEye-specific problems, or a result of NGApolicy changes, as GeoEye officials suggested.

Bothcompanies rely on the U.S. government, mainly NGA, for between 55-60 percent oftheir revenues, according to filings with the U.S. Securities and ExchangeCommission (SEC).

As befitstwo players in a young industry, DigitalGlobe and GeoEye have yet to stabilizetheir asset base. The failure of just one satellite in orbit, which can happenat any time, would have a dramatic effect on either company's health because ittakes as much as four years to build the kind of high-resolution opticalimaging satellites the two companies rely on.

DigitalGlobeannounced April 14 that it planned to raise $250 million from an initial publicstock offering on the New York Stock Exchange. The IPO is being managed byMorgan Stanley and Lehman Brothers.

In terms ofcurrent assets, DigitalGlobe would appear to have an advantage because it hastwo high-resolution spacecraft, the QuickBird satellite,launched in 2001, and the WorldView-1, launched in 2007. Absent an in-orbitglitch, the two satellites should continue to operate until 2010 and 2018,respectively, according to the IPO registration documents DigitalGlobe sent tothe SEC April 14.

A thirdsatellite, WorldView-2, tentatively is scheduled for launch in mid-2009 aboarda Boeing Delta 2 rocket, but as GeoEye recently learned, any slip in thesatellite's production schedule could mean the loss of a launch slot and adelay of several months in getting to orbit.

That delayhas proved costly for GeoEye, whose Ikonos satellite, launched in 1999, isalready two years past its scheduled design life. GeoEye said a late-2007review of its status concluded that it should continue operating until the endof 2010 at least.

GeoEye iscounting on the launch of its GeoEye-1 spacecraft to continue its NGA businessunder a contract called NextView. DigitalGlobe also has a contract under theNextView program, which is NGA's multi-year agreement to purchase images fromboth companies.

GeoEye hasbeen struggling to maintain its NextView revenue stream. The NextView deal wassigned with GeoEye-1 imagery in mind and a GeoEye-1 launch planned by March2007. Following a recent rescheduling with Boeing, the satellite now is slatedfor an Aug. 22 launch aboard a Delta 2 rocket.

But NGAreserves the right to reduce the amount of imagery it purchases in any givenperiod.

Bothcompanies cite the vagaries of NGA demand as a risk factor in their respectivebusinesses.

Anothermajor risk factor that both companies acknowledge in their respective SECfilings is the so far unresolved policy dispute about whether the U.S. government's remote sensing policy places the accent on commercially produced imagery orproducts derived from U.S.government-owned satellites.

With twohigh-resolution satellites now in orbit, DigitalGlobe is collecting "fourtimes the amount of square kilometers of high-resolution imagery per day as ourclosest competitor," the company said in its SEC filing.

The imageryis deposited into DigitalGlobe's ImageLibrary, an elaborate content archivethat is the source of a significant share of the company's annual salesrevenue.

GeoEyeconcedes that its competitor has an important new weapon since WorldView-1 enteredservice in late 2007, and not only because it added a second high-resolutionsatellite to DigitalGlobe's portfolio.

In additionto the improved frequency of overflight of a given area, the addition ofWorldView-1 also gives DigitalGlobe the ability to download data directly tocustomers, a capacity that QuickBird lacked. GeoEye said once DigitalGlobe hascompleted the installation of its network of WorldView-1 ground stations,GeoEye's "competitive advantage is no longer as strong."

GeoEye andDigitalGlobe both operate under U.S. government regulations that prohibitdistribution of black-and-white imagery sharper than 50 centimeters in groundresolution, and 2 meters for color imagery.

Bothcompanies also are facing increased market challenges from Europe, Israel and India. In Europe especially, the expected consolidation of the Earth observation assetsof Astriumunder the Astrium Services division will create a single company drawing on thestrengths of Spot Image of Toulouse, France, which has a global network ofaffiliates and partnership deals for optical imagery; and InfoTerra of Germanyand Britain, which has begun to commercialize high-resolution radar data.

Despitethis, both DigitalGlobe and GeoEye say one of their key strategic goals in thecoming years is to increase their presence in Brazil, China, India, Russia and other emerging markets.

• Satellites at SPACE.com
• The Top 10 Views of Earth From Space
• Image Gallery: ASTER Images of Our Earth

Ft. Lee,N.J.-based Globalstar is expected to conduct its IPO on the U.S. Nasdaq stockexchange the week of Oct. 30. The IPO seeks to raise a net of $108 million fromthe sale of 11.15 million shares of stock at an average price of $12 to $14 pershare.

Inpresentations to investors, Orbcomm's management said none of the company'sofficers, directors or major shareholders would be selling shares in the IPO.The IPO proceeds will be used to invest in Orbcomm's next-generation satellitesystem.

The companysays it will be able to deploy its second-generation satellites for $6 millioneach, including launch. It has six new satellites on order from its formerparent company, Orbital Sciences Corp. of Dulles, Va., with the satellites'platforms and launch provided by shareholder OHB-System of Bremen, Germany. OHB has contracted with Polyot of Omsk, Russia, for the launch of the experimentalsatellite on a Polyot-provided Cosmos rocket.

These sixsatellites are scheduled for launch in 2007, with another 18 satellites in thesecond-generation constellation to be launched starting in 2008.

That launchof the experimental satellite, previously set for late 2006, slipped to early2007 when Orbcomm's IPO, announced in May, was delayed.

Orbcommoperates a fleet of 30 satellites in low Earth orbit used for two-waymessaging, mainly machine-to-machine links, for owners of fixed and mobileassets seeking updates on the health and whereabouts of their goods. Itssatellites cover the entire planet and Orbcomm has operating licenses in 75nations. It recently received U.S. regulatory approval to operate 1 millionterminals in the United States; its previous license permitted 200,000terminals.

Orbcomm reportedthat as of Sept. 30 it had 199,000 fee-paying subscribers, compared to 113,000at the end of 2005. New, lighter-weight and less-expensive terminals built byDelphi Automotive Systems LLC and introduced in late 2005 now sell for $100when purchased in bulk, compared to the $280 units sold in 2003, Orbcomm ChiefMarketing Officer Marc Eisenberg said in a Web cast to investors.

Orbcomm inOctober signed its largest-ever contract with GE Asset Intelligence LLC, adivision of General Electric, for the delivery of up to 412,000 Orbcommsubscriber terminals through 2009, with 270,000 of those under firm contract.According to its Web site, GE owns 1.5 million tractors, trailers, rail carsand marine containers that it leases and rents to customers in more than 30countries. The company uses satellite technology to help its customers monitorand manage those assets.

In an Oct.19 IPO registration with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC),Orbcomm said the GE contract's value is $57 million if the full complement ofterminals is delivered.

MarcEisenberg said that in addition to Orbcomm's 199,000 current subscribers,another 19,900 subscribers have been pre-billed for service that has notstarted. A further 72,000 subscriber modems have been purchased but are not yetin service. Assuming the GE order is fully exercised, that would give Orbcommmore than 700,000 current and planned subscribers, he said.

OrbcommChief Financial Officer Robert Constantini said the company has a goal of 4million subscribers generating $250 million in annual revenues. Ultimately, hesaid, Orbcomm will post gross-profit margins "on a par with the best operatorsin the satellite business," which would mean better than 70 percent. That is along way from where the business is today.

Orbcommreported sales of $15.5 million in 2005 and $12.6 million for the first sixmonths of 2006. Net losses for 2005 were $9.1 million, with a net loss of $5.4million reported for the first half of 2006.

Itsrevenues have been split between sales of equipment and of services, with theservices side expected to grow quickly in the coming years. Orbcomm generates$5 to $6 per month in subscriber revenues.

OrbcommChief Executive Jerry Eisenberg said in the investor Web cast that the marketfor two-way machine-to-machine communications for asset tracking is expected togrow to more than 400 million units by 2012. He said the company could capture10 percent of that market.