‘The first firm to launch onto public markets is likely to capitalise on the current wave of AI enthusiasm, and raise huge sums from eager investors.’ It comes despite growing fears over recent months that the stratospheric valuations of listed AI-related firms on the New York stock market may have turned into a bubble that will soon burst. Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said that if the expected mega-floats are successful ‘others may well follow’ as investment bankers chase lucrative fee deals and AI firms seize the chance to raise the capital they need. But he added: ‘If history is any guide, investors will need to be increasingly discerning as the number of new deals grows. In sum, price can tend to go up as quality goes down.’ Musk’s rocket firm SpaceX has become the dominant player in the space sector. It holds multi-billion dollar contracts to launch payloads into space on behalf of customers including the US government and Nasa. It also includes satellite network operator Starlink, which has become a vital connectivity tool for the Ukrainian military as well as Iranian protesters. A key reason to join SpaceX with xAI is to make it easier to build data centres in space. Data centres are vast warehouses storing and processing data – and demand for them has exploded due to the rise of AI, such that some believe it may be better to build them in orbit. It comes as Tesla starts to shift focus from cars to robots – and after Musk told the World Economic Forum in Davos that his aim was to make ‘Star Trek for real’. Dan Ives, analyst at wealth manager Wedbush Securities, said: ‘Step by step the holy grail could be combining SpaceX and Tesla over the next 12 to 18 months.’ Meanwhile, however, earthly concerns continue to hold Musk back – with Paris authorities yesterday raiding X’s French HQ as part of a probe into the use of algorithms and data as well as the platform’s alleged complicity in the spread of child abuse imagery. Separately, Britain’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) announced an investigation into Grok over its ‘potential to produce harmful sexualised image and video content’. DIY INVESTING PLATFORMS