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WASHINGTON, Dec 12 (Reuters) - Investors eyeing SpaceX's potential blockbuster IPO may need to brace themselves as CEO balances his risky quest to reach Mars with growing the revenue-rich Starlink satellite broadband business that would offer more reliable shareholder returns.

 

SpaceX, which transformed space travel with reusable rockets and built a global satellite broadband network, is that could raise more than $25  billion at a valuation exceeding $1  trillion, which would rank among the largest initial public offerings in history.

 

Musk has always maintained that sending humans to Mars was his lifelong ambition. That should temper expectations that a publicly-listed SpaceX would narrow its focus on revenue-generating parts of the business like expanding Starlink into a direct-to-cell service or building space-based data centers, analysts say.

 

Investors in Musk's car company, Tesla , have also had to contend with balancing competing technologies and Musk's divided attention. The world's richest man has previously unsettled some investors by saying Tesla is not a car company but an artificial intelligence and robotics platform.

 

Investors have the SpaceX IPO. But Caleb Henry, analyst at space-focused research firm Quilty Analytics, said any buyer of SpaceX shares would need to accept that it has always invested billions of dollars in risky ventures, some of which, like Starlink and the Falcon 9 reusable rocket, have paid off after lengthy periods of experimentation.

 

"SpaceX has always been an R&D-heavy company and investors can sour if they feel they are not being rewarded for being investors. So, that can be hard," Henry said. "The investors of tomorrow will have to accept that."

 

SpaceX did not respond to a request for comment.

There have been several false dawns for a SpaceX public listing, which has long been intertwined with Musk’s Mars obsession.

 

SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said in 2018 that the company would not go public until it was flying regularly to Mars, a goal that has been repeatedly delayed.

 

Musk, who on Wednesday could be coming soon, has said SpaceX might launch an uncrewed Starship - its giant, next-generation rocket under development since around 2017 - to Mars next year. But analysts believe this is ambitious given the rocket has not yet completed a successful orbital mission.