SpaceX has secured a binding agreement for $40 billion in financing to acquire AI chips and data center hardware. The deal, described as the largest committed GPU financing, involves Apollo Global Management, which will purchase the equipment and lease it back to SpaceX.
Lease terms are set for five to five-and-a-quarter years, with the equipment delivery and lease commencement scheduled for the first half of 2027. The transaction is expected to close by the end of 2026, pending standard closing conditions.
The funding supports the expansion of SpaceX's AI infrastructure, including compute resources for the Grok chatbot, the Cursor coding tool, and cloud services. CFO Bret Johnsen noted that the company anticipates payback periods of less than one year on these investments.
In the third quarter of 2026, the AI segment generated $7.6 billion out of the company's total $14.6 billion in revenue. Capital expenditures reached nearly $20 billion in the same period, with projected spending of $35 billion to $40 billion for the fourth quarter.
