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LaunchPad: Falcon Heavy ready to go for commercial launch debut
This is a free preview of LaunchPad, one of Teslarati’s member-only launch briefing newsletters. Before each SpaceX launch, I’ll give you an inside look of what to expect and share amazing photos and on-the-ground details after the launch. Become a member today receive all of Teslarati’s newsletters.
SpaceX launch technicians and engineers have officially completed the integration and static fire testing of the second Falcon Heavy rocket ever, nearing the end of preflight preparations for the vehicle’s critical commercial launch debut.
Carrying the commercial communications satellite Arabsat 6A, the rocket will be tasked with placing the massive spacecraft into a high-energy geostationary orbit. After a combination of hurdles and conflicting priorities conspired to delay Arabsat 6A’s launch from mid-2018 to February, March, and eventually, April of 2019, both the spacecraft and rocket are nearly ready to go. If all goes as planned, SpaceX will also complete the first successful launch and near-simultaneous landings of three independent rocket boosters, preparing two of the three boosters for reuse on a launch that could happen as early as June 2019.
When: 6:35 pm EDT, 22:35 UTC (click for your time), April 10th
What: Arabsat 6A, communications satellite, ~6000 kg (13,200 lb)
Where: Pad 39A, Kennedy Space Center, Florida
Boosters: B1052.1, B1053.1, B1055.1
Recovery: Yes; drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) & LZ-1/2
Weather: 80% GO, 4/10
Falcon 9 Block 5, meet Falcon Heavy
- With this Falcon Heavy, SpaceX has effectively built – once again – a center stage that is nearly its own rocket, much like the tortured development of the first vehicle’s center stage can be blamed for a lot of its years of delays.
- Based on Falcon 9 V1.2’s Block 3 iteration, Falcon Heavy Flight 1’s center core was effectively outdated a year before it launched, and Falcon 9 Block 5 debuted just three months after its first and last launch.
- Combined with the center core’s untimely demise when it crashed into the Atlantic after running out of engine starter, the now 14 months separating Flight 1 and Flight 2 of Falcon Heavy can be explained by the rocket’s delayed path to the launch site.
- By the time the first Falcon Heavy’s main components were all present in at the launch site, SpaceX was already building Block 5 rockets and was as few as three months away from completely transitioning its Hawthorne, CA factory to Block 5.
- Due to the extensive changes in production incorporated into Block 5, this was effectively a no-turning-back deal where the cost of transitioning back was simply a non-starter.
- By the time Falcon Heavy had launched, and its center core had smashed itself to pieces on the Atlantic Ocean surface, it was far too late to begin producing a replacement copy. One step further, the process of ramping up Block 5 production had been slowed significantly by the drastic changes made across the board, taking SpaceX to the edge of production-related launch delays over the course of 2018.
- Put simply, building two side boosters and a relatively boutique Falcon Heavy center core – all three of which would be inextricably tied together for the foreseeable future – was not a practical option when three separate Falcon 9 Block 5 boosters could instead support 6-12+ launches over a period of six or so months.
(Hopefully) the first of many
- In the nominal event that SpaceX’s second Falcon Heavy launch is an unqualified success, it’s entirely possible that the doors to new markets could be opened as the world and its many spacefaring customers begin to contemplate the existence of an affordable super-heavy-lift launch vehicle – the first of its kind.
- On the outside, Falcon Heavy can begin to look like a bit of a boondoggle from a business perspective. It will have probably cost no less than $750M-$1B to develop, including the Block 5 modifications needed, and likely brought in less than $100M in gross revenue. It’s a black hole that SpaceX currently dumps huge volumes of cash into, in other words.
- However, this sort of observation is far too pessimistic and gives SpaceX far too little credit after some additional careful analysis. As of today, SpaceX has six public launch contracts for FH, two of which are from the USAF/NRO and likely valued around $130M-$150M.
- Purely commercial contracts for Falcon Heavy will probably be closer to $90M-100M, more than competitive with rockets like Atlas 5, Delta IV Heavy, Ariane 5, and other future vehicles like ULA’s Vulcan.
- Within ~12 months, the USAF will likely have awarded 10-16 additional launch contracts to some combo of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy as part of the latest EELV (now NSSL) acquisition phase. Assuming SpaceX is one of the two providers chosen, Falcon Heavy could receive numerous additional contracts for heavy military satellites.
- Additionally, NASA is now seriously considering Falcon Heavy for the launch of flagship missions like Europa Clipper and (maybe, maybe not) even Orion missions to the Moon.
- Falcon Heavy could also be the only vehicle in the world with the performance needed for a number of other missions that could arise from the Lunar Gateway, including launching actual segments of the space station and launching deep space cargo missions resupply said Gateway.
- Only ULA’s Delta IV Heavy can marginally compete with Falcon Heavy’s performance, but it typically costs no less than $300M per launch, a 2-3X surcharge over SpaceX’s offering. Due to the utter and complete lack of competition from both a price and performance perspective, SpaceX could essentially have the heavy life market cornered for something like 48-60+ months.
- Offering a unique product with potentially high demand and no real alternative, SpaceX would not be out of place to raise its profit margins significantly, helping to rapidly pay back the capital investment it put into Falcon Heavy’s extended development.
- Regardless, the future of Falcon Heavy has every right to be even more thrilling and diverse than the already impressive Falcon 9.
You can watch Falcon Heavy’s commercial launch debut live here on April 10th at 6:35 pm EDT (22:35 UTC). We’ll see you after the launch at LandingZone with exclusive photos and on-the-ground details of Falcon Heavy’s center core recovery.
Elon Musk
SpaceX (SPCX) IPO is live today at $135: Here’s exactly what you need to know
SpaceX priced its historic IPO at $135 per share today, raising a record $75 billion.
SpaceX officially priced its initial public offering at $135 per share, offering 555,555,555 shares of Class A common stock and raising $75 billion in what is the largest IPO in stock market history. Shares are set to begin trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market on Friday, June 12, under the ticker symbol SPCX. The previous record holder was Saudi Aramco’s 2019 offering at $29 billion, followed by Alibaba’s $22 billion offering in 2014.
At $135 per share and roughly 555.6 million shares, the implied valuation sits near $1.75 trillion, which would make SpaceX roughly the seventh largest company in the United States, just above Tesla’s current market cap. Regular investors can request shares at the IPO price through Robinhood, Fidelity, Charles Schwab, SoFi, and E*TRADE, though the deal is heavily oversubscribed and most retail allocations will be partial or unfilled. Once trading opens June 12, anyone with a brokerage account can buy SPCX on the open market.
SpaceX’s amended S-1 is sparking a major Tesla merger conversation
The valuation is anchored primarily by Starlink. Starlink crossed 10 million subscribers as of February 2026 and is adding 750,000 to 1.5 million new users per month, with the connectivity segment already posting a $1.19 billion profit last quarter. The offering also bundles in xAI following SpaceX’s all-stock merger earlier this year, adding Grok and the Colossus supercomputer to the investment thesis. As Teslarati reported, Starlink ended 2025 with $10 billion in revenue, a figure analysts project could reach $24 billion by end of 2026.
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives has been vocal in his support. “I think the time is right,” Ives said, adding that the offering expands the Elon Musk ecosystem rather than competing with Tesla. An average 12-month price target of $165 per share represents roughly 22% upside from the IPO price. Not everyone agrees – Motley Fool noted xAI is spending $1 billion per month playing catch-up to OpenAI and Anthropic.
Musk founded SpaceX in 2002 with a single stated purpose. “Elon founded SpaceX with a goal to change humanity, to make us a multi-planet species,” CFO Bret Johnsen said in the company’s retail roadshow video this week. Musk himself has been more direct: “We are building the systems and technologies necessary to provide global connectivity on Earth and beyond, to understand the true nature of the universe, and to extend the light of consciousness to the stars.”
Investor's Corner
Tesla unfolded its first European “folding Supercharger”
Tesla’s folding Supercharger just arrived in Europe and it changes how fast charging expands.
Tesla’s Folding Unit Supercharger has officially landed in Europe, with the company teasing a new installation in its effort for a broader rollout targeting major motorway rest stops across the European continent in Q3 2026. The arrival marks a notable shift in how Tesla is thinking about network expansion, moving from hardware performance alone to engineering the logistics chain itself.
While Tesla did not reveal the exact location for the new folding Supercharger in Europe, the photo shared on X heavily suggests that this maybe somewhere in Norway. Historically, whenever Tesla rolls out an entirely new infrastructure architecture in Europe, whether it was the original Supercharger stalls years ago or these brand-new modular V4 “Folding Units”, Norway is almost always the designated launch pad because of its unmatched EV adoption rate and supportive infrastructure
The Folding Unit, introduced in March 2026, is a factory pre-assembled V4 charging station built on an industrial hinge system mounted to a heavy-duty concrete base. The entire assembly arrives on site ready to unfold and connect. Tesla confirmed the units feature telescopic light poles specifically designed for easy transportation and fast on-site deployment, a detail that signals how carefully the logistics chain has been engineered alongside the hardware itself. The design allows 33% more stalls per delivery truck, cuts installation time roughly in half, and reduces overall deployment costs by more than 20% compared to traditional installations.
Tesla’s newest “Folding V4 Superchargers” are key to its most aggressive expansion yet
Tesla also noted telescopic light poles which provide benefits over traditional Supercharger installations that require fixed-height poles that are awkward to ship, slow to position on site, and often require separate crews and equipment to erect before charging hardware can even be staged. By engineering poles that compress for transit and extend on arrival, Tesla has removed one of the quieter bottlenecks in the physical deployment process. Every hour saved on a light pole installation is an hour redirected toward getting stalls energized. At scale, across dozens of new sites per quarter, those hours add up to a meaningful acceleration in how quickly a location goes from approved permit to serving its first customer.
Each Folding Unit pairs a single V4 power cabinet with eight charging posts. The V4 cabinet delivers up to 500 kW per stall for passenger vehicles and up to 1.2 MW for the Tesla Semi, supporting twice the stalls per cabinet at three times the power density of its predecessor. Longer cables make every new station immediately usable by non-Tesla vehicles, a priority as Tesla continues opening its network to Ford, GM, Rivian, Hyundai, Stellantis, and others.
As Teslarati reported when the Folding Unit was first unveiled, Tesla’s Gigafactory New York produced its final V3 Supercharger cabinet in March 2026 after more than seven years and 15,000 units, completing a full pivot to V4 production. The European arrival of the folding design is the next chapter in that transition.
Faster and cheaper deployment means Tesla can justify building in markets and corridors that were previously too expensive to serve, filling the coverage gaps that have slowed EV adoption outside major urban centers.
First Folding Unit Superchargers in Europe 🇪🇺 https://t.co/KNfYWJukkL pic.twitter.com/YR1udIpH1i
— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) June 10, 2026
Tesla has stunned by gaining yet another approval for its Full Self-Driving suite in Europe, its second in two days and its fifth overall.
Belgium will be the latest country to allow Tesla owners to utilize FSD on public roads in Europe, joining a quickly growing list that started with the Netherlands, Lithuania, and Estonia.
On Tuesday, Denmark announced its approval of the FSD suite, which has now been followed by Belgium just one day later.
The country’s Minister of Mobility, Annick De Ridder, announced the approval on her X account, stating that she had just signed the approval of Tesla FSD. It now goes to the country’s homologation department for the last step of the approval process.
De @Tesla community houdt hier al geruime tijd de vinger aan de pols over de toelating voor de FSD-technologie op onze Vlaamse en Belgische wegen.
Uit waardering voor jullie niet-aflatende interesse (en aanmoediging 😉), krijgen jullie hierbij de primeur: ik heb net de toelating… pic.twitter.com/Yrps4OHTj8— Annick De Ridder (@AnnickDeRidder) June 10, 2026
The Belgian approval is one of mighty importance because it truly shows how quickly countries in Europe could greenlight the FSD suite consecutively. Approvals are already coming in relatively quickly, which is a great sign.
Perhaps the next big development that could come from FSD approvals in Europe is an approval from a country like England, Italy, France, Spain, or Germany. It would be something to see how FSD would perform in a major European metro, such as London, Barcelona, Madrid, Paris, Rome, or Berlin.
Getting Full Self-Driving in Spain and England will be such huge milestones for Tesla. I am so excited to see how FSD performs in Madrid, Barcelona, and London, specifically.
The ultimate test will always be Mumbai or New Delhi. Excited for India’s eventual approval! https://t.co/paw9Ch1qmL pic.twitter.com/9RdDERVSSJ
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) June 9, 2026
Full Self-Driving does an excellent job of roaming around major U.S. cities like New York and Los Angeles, but other high-profile international cities of significance would truly mark a line in the sand for Tesla, which can simply enable any vehicle in its customer-owned fleet to run FSD with the correct approvals.
SpaceX (SPCX) IPO is live today at $135: Here’s exactly what you need to know
Tesla unfolded its first European “folding Supercharger”
