Scott Wu, CEO of Cognition, denied that SpaceX had entered talks to acquire his startup, which specializes in AI programming software. The denial came in a post on X shortly after Bloomberg published a report, citing people familiar with the matter, saying that SpaceX had attempted to buy Cognition as part of its effort to strengthen its presence in the artificial intelligence market and compete with OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google.
Wu wrote that the report was inaccurate, confirming that Cognition “is not for sale” and that the two companies had not entered acquisition talks. SpaceX and Cognition did not respond to requests for comment, so the article contains no independent confirmation of the details of the talks reported by Bloomberg.
Context: SpaceX’s Acquisition of Cursor
The report comes days after SpaceX completed a $60 billion acquisition of Cursor, another company working in AI-powered programming tools. Cursor and SpaceX had been collaborating before the deal closed, and the two companies launched the Grok 4.6 model this month, which achieved higher results in programming benchmarks and complex, multistep agentic tasks.
Earlier this year, SpaceX had already acquired Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI. The company then went public in June, and its market capitalization rose to around $2.3 trillion at its peak, according to the report.
Why Does This Matter?
The developments show that programming tools have become one of the clearest commercial paths to generating revenue from artificial intelligence. The report cites Anthropic’s rapid growth, to which Claude Code contributed significantly, as an example of this market’s appeal to enterprise customers.
Acquiring Cognition would have given SpaceX access to the Devin programming agent and an enterprise customer base that includes Mercedes-Benz, Citi, and Goldman Sachs. However, Wu’s denial means this possibility cannot be treated as an existing or completed deal.
Potential Collaboration and Expected Funding
Bloomberg reported that the acquisition talks were no longer active, but indicated that discussions about cooperation between the two companies were continuing. One possibility under discussion was for Cognition to use SpaceX’s computing capacity, which the company also sells to other entities in the AI sector, including Anthropic, until it needs it internally. Wu did not specifically address this part in his denial.
Cognition is considered one of the largest independent AI programming software companies that has not yet been acquired by a major AI model developer. In late May, the company raised $1 billion at a post-money valuation of $25 billion, while Bloomberg reported that it was holding preliminary talks for a new round at a valuation of up to $40 billion.
These developments follow Cognition’s acquisition of the remaining assets of its rival Windsurf, after Google DeepMind acquired the company’s CEO and core research team in a $2.4 billion deal that included talent and licensing rights. After the integration, Cognition laid off 30 employees and made buyout offers to the rest of Windsurf’s 200 employees, according to the report.