TL;DR
SpaceX has agreed to acquire AI coding tool Cursor for $60 billion in stock. The move is an attempt by Elon Musk to gain ground in the AI coding market, where his AI division xAI has struggled to compete with Anthropic and OpenAI.
xAI has struggled to compete with Anthropic and OpenAI on AI coding tools. Cursor is Musk’s answer.
Elon Musk may be winning on Wall Street, but he’s still losing the AI coding war. Four days after SpaceX completed the biggest IPO in history, the company confirmed Tuesday it has agreed to acquire Cursor, one of the most widely used AI coding tools among professional developers, for $60 billion in stock, according to Bloomberg.
The move is an admission of sorts. Musk has been open about the fact that his AI division can’t keep up with Anthropic and OpenAI. Analysts say xAI has so far failed to make a dent in a market led by those two companies, plus Google and Meta.
Cursor is Musk’s answer. Founded in 2022 by San Francisco startup Anysphere, the tool generated approximately $2.6 billion in annualized business-to-business revenue by June 2026 and has become one of the fastest-growing startups in history. With $60 billion in freshly minted SpaceX stock and a product millions of developers already trust, Musk is betting he can buy his way into a war he’s been losing.
In this story
This story was originally published by Jonathan Small in Entrepreneur Franchise on June 17, 2026. Burnaze summarizes and links to the original reporting.
Read the full story at Entrepreneur FranchiseLiked this? Get the week's franchise news, explained
- Sunday 8 AM ET weekly + a monthly deep dive
- Sections picked for the industries you follow
- Every claim linked to its source. Free.