Nuclear startup X-energy launched an investor roadshow on Tuesday as it works toward its IPO, setting a target price of $16 to $19 a share. documents have been provided With the US Securities and Exchange Commission. If it makes it to the top, the startup could earn about $814 million.
X-energy and its peers are experiencing a resurgence of interest in fission power as electricity demand increases thanks to artificial intelligence data centers and society-wide electrification.
Amazon is one of the biggest supporters of X-energy. The tech giant led a $500 million Series C-1 round and committed to an acquisition. Up to 5 gigawatts Nuclear power from the company until 2039.
According to PitchBook, the IPO will come as a relief to X-energy’s investors, who have invested about $1.8 billion in the company. The startup had previously attempted to go public through a reverse merger with a private equity firm, but the two sides canceled the contract In 2023, the SPAC craze died down.
The X-energy reactor is known as a high-temperature, gas-cooled reactor. Inside, uranium encased in ceramic and carbon spheres is cooled by helium gas. The gas then transfers the heat to a steam turbine circuit to generate electricity. The fuel design, known as TRISO, is not widely used today, but is expected to be safer than previous fuel arrangements.
Startup said its SEC filing It is already embroiled in a patent dispute with another company that recently went bankrupt. The Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation (USNC) went bankrupt in 2024 and its assets were purchased in bankruptcy. Creating a Standard Core. X-energy claims that USNC infringes on its fuel production patents and that the matter was not satisfactorily resolved during the bankruptcy proceedings.
Development of new nuclear reactors outside of China has been stalled by delays and cost overruns. A new generation of startups hopes to overcome some of the challenges surrounding traditional designs by shrinking reactors.
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None of the small modular reactor startups has built a power plant yet, though several are racing to meet a July 4 deadline set by the Trump administration.
Although many miss the arbitrary deadline, they will still reach criticality when fission reactions are self-sustaining.
But the road from criticality to profitable power plants is likely to be long. Mass production can help keep costs down, but is usually required about ten years for the process to start paying dividends. Moreover, the number of reactors these companies plan to build may be greater than what other companies have attempted, but it may not be high enough to reap the true benefits of mass production.
X-energy expects that by the time the reactor’s production technologies are mature – what experts call “n-type” – it will be able to reduce costs by 30% compared to the first type. Investors should pay attention to how much the first reactor costs. It can make or break a company’s prospects.
