i.e. using the technology in order to make money from the status quo.
Musk appears to be chasing a private landing on Mars, using the technology to fund that end goal.
(, Wed 21 Jul 2021, 11:50, Reply)
but more crucially he needs government support for the technology to do more than just land at Mars. ISRU is going to need either a submarine-style nuclear reactor (necessitating government licenses and whatnot) or a supermassive solar farm, and there are serious problems launching anywhere near either of those (necessitating a heavy rover and miles of cable to move your power station out of the debris zone).
I don't think SpaceX is actually making any money at the moment, setting up Starlink and Starship and Starbase and the oil rig conversions and so on, while still maintaining the fleet of Dragons and Falcons and everything else.
(, Wed 21 Jul 2021, 15:37, Reply)