According to a rumor yesterday, word on the street was that Google was planning on investing in SpaceX. The company was reportedly planning to spend billions of dollars on Elon Musk’s space travel program, but it was less about space travel and more about satellites which Google could then use to further Project Loon.It turns out that the rumors were true after all as SpaceX has recently confirmed that the company has managed to raise as much as $1 billion in a new round of funding, some of which had come from Google and Fidelity, which would add them to the list of investors that currently includes Founders Fund, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Valor Equity Partners and Capricorn.
The investment of $1 billion would be giving Google and Fidelity a stake that is just shy of 10%. SpaceX did not confirm Google’s reason for investing into the company, but many have speculated it would be because of the satellite technology involved. This is something that SpaceX’s Elon Musk spoke about last week to Bloomberg.
Musk had stated that the initiative would be expensive and it could be a while before we see results, but we guess it’s still something to look forward to. “People should not expect this to be active sooner than five years. But we see it as a long-term revenue source for SpaceX to be able to fund a city on Mars.”