News
SpaceX will host Hyperloop Pod Competition next week, Jan 27-29, 2017
Get ready to see Hyperloop concept pods fire through the 1-mile test track located outside of SpaceX and Tesla’s Design Studio in Hawthorne, California, next week between January 27-29. Elon Musk and SpaceX first unveiled the idea for a new high-speed ground transport system called the Hyperloop on August 12, 2013 with the publication of a white paper, the Hyperloop Alpha Preliminary Design Study. SpaceX’s sponsored Hyperloop Pod Competition is an incentive prize competition created to inspire university students and independent engineering teams to design and build a subscale prototype transport vehicle (a “Hyperloop pod”) that will demonstrate technical feasibility of various aspects of the high speed transportation concept. To support this competition, SpaceX has constructed a test track outside of its headquarters which we had the opportunity to see during early construction last year.
There are three judging phases in the Hyperloop Pod competition: a design competition that was held in January 2016 and an on-track competition to be held January 27–29, 2017 (Competition Weekend I), followed by a Summer 2017 (Competition Weekend II). The original specification for the Competition Basic for the Design Weekend and the competition Weekend I, though no longer available at SpaceX, can still be found online.
DESIGN WEEKEND
The Design weekend was held in January 2016 at Texas A&M University. Awards were given in three categories:
SUBSYSTEM
Best Overall Subsystem Award: Auburn University | Auburn University Hyperloop Team.
DESIGN ONLY
Top Design Concept Award: Universitat Politècnica de Valencia | Makers UPV Team
DESIGN AND BUILD CATEGORY OVERALL
Massachusetts Institute of Technology | MIT Hyperloop Team
MIT Hyperloop Team’s design was awarded the “Best Overall Design Award”, among the 23 designs selected to move to the prototype stage. The design proposes a 250 kg (551 lb) pod with a carbon fiber and polycarbonate sheet exterior. It is elevated by a passive magnetic levitation system comprising 20 neodymium magnets that will maintain a 15 mm (0.6 in) distance above the track. The team says with air pressure at 140 Pascals, the pod could accelerate at 2.4 G and have 2 Newton aerodynamic drag when traveling at 110 m/s. The design includes a fail-safe braking system that automatically halts the pod should the actuators or computers fail, and low speed emergency drive wheels that can move the pod 1 m/s. Delft Hyperloop received a “Pod Innovation Award”, while Badgerloop at University of Wisconsin, Madison, Hyperloop at Virginia Tech, and HyperXite at UC Irvine each received a “Pod Technical Excellence Award.” The full list of Awards and news clips from the Design Weekend can be found at the Texas A&M University Engineering web site. Besides the winning teams, several other teams were invited to compete in the upcoming Competition Weekend I from the Design and Build category:
- rLoop (Non-student team)
- University of Waterloo | uWaterloo Hyperloop
- University of Washington | UWashington Hyperloop
- University of Toronto | University of Toronto
- University of Maryland and Rutgers University | RUMD Loop
- University of Florida | GatorLoop
- University of of Colorado, Denver | Team HyperLynx
- University of Cincinnati | Hyperloop UC
- University of California, Santa Barbara | UCSB Hyperloop
- University of California, Berkeley | bLoop
- Texas A&M University | TAMU Aerospace Hyperloop
- Technical University of Munich | WARR Hyperloop
- Purdue University | Purdue Hyperloop Design Team
- Oral Roberts University | Codex
- Lehigh University | Lehigh Hyperloop
- Keio University | Keio Alpha
- Drexel University | Drexel Hyperloop
- Carnegie Mellon University | Carnegie Mellon Hyperloop
In February 3, 2016 eight more teams advanced to Competition Weekend I.
- Cornell University + Harvey Mudd College + University of Michigan + Northeastern University + Memorial University of Newfoundland(Canada) + Princeton University | OpenLoop
- Louisiana State University | Bayou Bengals
- New York University | NYU Hyperloop
- RMIT University | VicHyper
- John’s High School | HyperLift
- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | Illini Hyperloop
- University of Southern California | USC Hyperloop
- University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee | Mercury Three
In the end, 30 of the 115 teams that submitted designs in January 2016 were selected to build hardware to compete in Competition Weekend I. There were more than 1,000 applicants at earlier stages of the competition.
JUDGING CRITERIA
Originally, the second Phase of the competition was supposed to involve competitive runs in the Hyperloop test track to be awarded based on various classes (fully functional pod, susbsystem test pod, etc.) and pod mass. This phase of the competition was renamed“Competition Weekend I,” when SpaceX added a third phase of the competition, Competition Weekend II. The original SpaceX Hyperloop Pod Competition – Rules and Requirements for Weekend I can be seen at the end of this article. We’ve embedded a copy of the original document from SpaceX.
The Judging Criteria are listed in the document, and involve scoring in 4 different categories, for a maximum overall total of 2500 points.
- Category 1: Final Design and Construction (500 points)
- Category 2: Safety and Reliability (500 points)
- Category 3: Performance in Operations (500 points)
- Category 4: Performance in Flight (1000 points)
Competition Weekend I Judging Criteria – Source: SpaceX
HYPERLOOP TEST TRACK
AECOM, a company that has designed and built some of the world’s most impressive transportation systems, was selected to design and build the world’s first Hyperloop test track as part of the pod competition hosted by SpaceX
SpaceX Hyperloop Test Track (Jan.7, 2017) [Source: Teslarati via Marco Papa]
The track is a straight one-mile run on Jack Northrop Avenue, between Crenshaw Blvd. and Prairie Ave. The SpaceX Hyperloop test track — or Hypertube — was designed in 2015 and was constructed in the fall 2016, reaching its full length of one mile by October 2016. The test track’s six-foot diameter steel tube includes a non-magnetic sub-track and said to be capable of achieving 99.8 percent vacuum. The test track itself is also a prototype, where SpaceX anticipates learning from the design, build process and evaluates how to apply automated construction techniques to future Hyperloop tracks.
The Hypertube test track is designed to enable competitors who implement a wide array of designs and build pods that will test a variety of subsystem technologies that are important to new vehicle transport systems. This will include Hyperloop-specific pods—with air-bearing suspension and low-pressure compressor designs—as well as wheeled vehicle and magnetic levitation rail designs that will support a wide array of vehicle technologies to be tested. While the Design Weekend held at Texas A&M University was open to the public, it is unclear if the Competition Weekend I will be as well, or if it will be an invitation only event like many of the SpaceX and Tesla events. Several inquiries for tickets posted to the Twitter account of the Hyperloop Pod Competition went unanswered. The Official SpaceX Hyperloop Pod Competition page does not shed any light on who will be able to attend either.
HYPERLOOP POD COMPETITION II
According to SpaceX, “based on the high-quality submissions and overwhelming enthusiasm surrounding the competition, SpaceX is moving forward with a second installment of the competition: Hyperloop Pod Competition II, which will culminate in a second competition in Summer 2017 at SpaceX’s Hyperloop test track. Hyperloop Competition II will be focused on a single criterion: maximum speed. The second competition is open to new student teams interested in competing on the test track, as well as to existing student teams who have already built and tested Pods to further refine their designs.” The Competition Weekend II event will be held in the Summer 2017 at the same SpaceX Hyperloop test track.
[pdf-embedder url=”http://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/spacex-hyperloop-competition-rules.pdf”]
Investor's Corner
SpaceX’s biggest earnings test yet lands Tuesday, and Tesla shareholders should be watching
SpaceX reports earnings Tuesday as Wall Street watches AI spending, Starlink growth and Tesla merger
SpaceX reports third quarter results after the market closes Tuesday, with a webcast at 4:30 p.m. ET streamed on X, and Tesla follows a day later. Bloomberg consensus, cited by Pepperstone, calls for revenue of $12.89 billion, adjusted EBITDA of $6.62 billion and adjusted EPS near $0.15. That would be about 65% growth from the second quarter and SpaceX’s first profitable quarter since its IPO. Analysts expect roughly $6.4 billion from AI and $4.9 billion from Starlink, which is projected to reach 14.3 million consumer subscribers. Capital spending is forecast at $19.6 billion, leaving free cash flow near negative $11.6 billion.
The numbers matter because SpaceX has spent months trying to win over a skeptical market. It priced its record IPO at $135, spiked to $225.64, then sank near $105 in early August. Friday’s close of $146.03 sits about 28% below the June high. The Q2 report beat on revenue at $7.8 billion and put Starlink at 12 million subscribers, but $18.4 billion of capex hurt the stock. Since then SpaceX reached orbit on Starship Flight 14 with 26 Starlink V3 satellites, agreed to buy 800 MHz spectrum for about $8 billion as part of its Starlink Mobile push, and signed a fourth compute hosting deal in four months worth roughly $13 billion a year from December. Management is targeting more than 2 gigawatts of compute by year end and a $100 billion annualized revenue run rate. Evercore ISI, which raised its target to $275, said the quarter may be judged more on those targets than the reported figures
All of this sits under the Tesla merger question. Barclays analyst Dan Levy expects an all stock deal in which SpaceX buys Tesla at a premium, using reference values of $2.1 trillion and $1.5 trillion, and said an announcement would need to come by late October or early November to be voted on at Tesla’s December 6 annual meeting. Barclays estimates Musk would hold about 37% of the combined company and 56% of the votes. Musk said in July that combining companies cannot be discussed on an earnings call, but an investor question asking when SpaceX will merge with Tesla is sitting on SpaceX’s Q&A platform, and Teslarati has tracked how the Roadster demo revived the talk.
If a deal happens, Tuesday’s result would effectively set the price Tesla holders would receive. Their shares would convert into SpaceX stock, along with exposure to a company with a heavy investment on AI, while Tesla itself expects 2026 capex above $25 billion. A strong quarter and calmer spending would make that exchange easier to sell. Another round of heavy capex and a falling stock would make it harder.
News
SpaceX’s Gwynne Shotwell just made a quiet gesture toward Tesla
SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell quietly followed Tesla on X, and merger watchers noticed right away.
SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell has started following Tesla’s official account on X, a small change that landed in the middle of a very loud merger conversation. Whole Mars Catalog joked about it on Sunday.
A follow is not an announcement, and neither company has said anything about a deal. What gives the moment weight is the timing. Barclays analyst Dan Levy has told clients that an agreement could come before Tesla’s annual meeting, which must be held by December 6, with SpaceX as the buyer in an all stock deal, as we reported after the Roadster unveiling. Wedbush’s Dan Ives has stuck with a 2027 timeline.
“Shit, I better start following their X account if i’m gonna be helping run the company”
— Whole Mars Catalog (@wholemars) October 18, 2026
Shotwell is the executive most worth watching if the two companies do move closer. When Musk was asked at the All In Summit why Tesla and SpaceX remain separate, Shotwell sat next to him and said SpaceX personnel had already moved into xAI to fill leadership and engineering gaps. The businesses were integrating “faster than I thought,” she said, though “not fully integrated yet.” Her responsibilities have also grown since SpaceX absorbed xAI, and she now oversees operations that include Grok and the company’s AI compute buildout.
The financial links are already there. Tesla’s $2 billion xAI investment turned into a stake of less than one percent in SpaceX, the two share the Terafab chip project in Austin, and Musk exercised his 2018 Tesla options a week after SpaceX began trading, a sequence analysts flagged as giving SpaceX public shares to use in a deal. Musk holds about 20 percent of Tesla and controls 85.1 percent of SpaceX’s voting power, according to our earlier breakdown.
The next test is close at hand. SpaceX reports its second earnings as a public company on Tuesday after the close, and Tesla follows on Wednesday. Musk told analysts in July that “we can’t talk about combining companies and that kind of thing on an earnings call,” so a direct answer is unlikely from either stage. Tesla shareholders can still submit and vote on questions through the Say portal until 4 p.m. EDT on Monday, and the merger is a recurring theme in the queue.
Elon Musk
Tesla Roadster owners to get “Flying Stunt Mode” and looping track access
Musk says Roadster owners can command the unveiling stunts autonomously, with a Texas looping track.
Elon Musk says owners of the new Tesla Roadster will be able to ask the car to perform the stunts Tesla showed at its unveiling, with the car doing the driving itself. Musk made the comment Saturday in a reply on X to tech blogger Robert Scoble, and he added a promise of a looping track at Tesla’s Texas headquarters.
Scoble had argued that the person in the Roadster is not really driving it. In his description, the driver operates a computer that tells another computer what to do, with steering, braking and acceleration all handled by wire. Musk answered, “True. You will be able to ask the Roadster to perform any of the tricks shown autonomously, as it will be sentient. Also, we will have a wild looping track (crazier even than Hot Wheels) at our Texas HQ where you can test out your Roadster.”
@Scobleizer True.
You will be able to ask the Roadster to perform any of the tricks shown autonomously, as it will be sentient.
Also, we will have a wild looping track (crazier even than Hot Wheels) at our Texas HQ where you can test out your Roadster.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 17, 2026
At the October 15 event outside Waco, the car drove up a curved ramp until it was upside down, flew off on cold gas thrusters, flipped and landed. It also hovered over a Cybercab, Cybertruck, Semi, Model Y and Model 3 while moving. As we noted in our breakdown of the three Roadster configurations, Musk said at the event that the car “literally is just going to puff itself up” to perform the maneuvers whenever an owner wants. Saturday’s reply adds that the car would run them on its own.
Tesla has described some of the hardware that would make that possible. The Roadster uses steer by wire with a yoke, and its cold gas thrusters rely on electric actuators for small adjustments in flight. A fan system under the car creates suction, which Tesla says is strong enough to hold it upside down, a setup we covered in our look at the Roadster’s fan system and thrusters.
Musk did not say when an autonomous stunt feature might arrive, how it would work, or what he means by sentient. He also gave no size, location or opening date for the Texas track. Production is planned for Giga Texas in 2027 or 2028, and Tesla says the car is not approved for public road use. The Rocket version, the one built to fly, is invite only.
The comment follows a week of Musk teasing the event, including his claim that the demo would be a banger, which we covered before the stream. Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21, and shareholders can submit and vote on questions through the Say portal until 4 p.m. EDT on October 20, according to our earnings Q&A preview. A question about autonomous Roadster stunts and the Texas track would be a quick way to get specifics from management.
SpaceX’s biggest earnings test yet lands Tuesday, and Tesla shareholders should be watching
SpaceX’s Gwynne Shotwell just made a quiet gesture toward Tesla
Tesla Roadster owners to get “Flying Stunt Mode” and looping track access
SpaceX reveals how its 1 Million AI satellite network will work and prevent space collisions
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
