Technology and Science22 May, 20262 min read
SpaceX Taps F2Pool Co-Founder Chun Wang to Command First Private Mars Flyby Mission
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Chun Wang will command SpaceX's first private crewed Mars mission. He is co-founder of F2Pool, a major cryptocurrency mining pool.
Wang to Command Mars
SpaceX tapped Chun Wang, co-founder of F2Pool, to command its first private crewed mission to Mars, with the company giving no launch date.
Decrypt said the announcement came during a livestream of the now scrubbed Starship V3 launch on Thursday, minutes before that launch attempt was scheduled to take place.
Wang said in a recorded video from the remote Bouvet Island in the South Atlantic that “let's get it started with a flyby,” framing the Mars plan as a first step rather than an immediate landing.
Wang, who previously funded and commanded Fram2, told an interview at Bitcoin 2025, “So, don’t trust, verify. I verified space.”
Countdown Scrub and Training
Gizmodo reported that with less than 15 minutes left in the countdown, SpaceX introduced Wang during the live webcast by playing a video of the cryptocurrency billionaire speaking from Bouvet Island in the South Atlantic Ocean.
Gizmodo also said SpaceX has not shared a target launch date for the Mars mission, but Wang described his plan as a Starship flyby of the Moon and Mars.
In the same Gizmodo account, Wang said, “I can stare at the map view on airplanes all the way from takeoff through landing, so I think I'm going to enjoy the trip,” while SpaceX communications manager Huot appeared in the recorded interview.
Gizmodo further reported that Thursday’s launch attempt was canceled at the last minute due to a mechanical issue with the launch tower, and that SpaceX planned to try again targeting liftoff at 6:30 p.m. ET.
Timeline, Stakes, and Scrutiny
Decrypt said the round-trip journey to Mars is expected to take roughly two years, with the actual flyby of the planet lasting just a few hours, while SpaceX had not yet announced a launch date and Starship had not yet reached orbit or carried astronauts to space.
“Mars will no longer [be] a distant place. It will become reality.”
The Block reported that before the trip to Mars, Wang would join SpaceX’s first commercial human spaceflight around the Moon on Starship, which is scheduled to last one week, and that SpaceX did not include specific launch dates for Wang’s lunar or Mars missions.
In a separate account, The Block quoted Wang saying in an attached video, “Mars will no longer [be] a distant place. It will become reality.”
Decrypt also noted that in April 2025 Musk said SpaceX planned to launch an uncrewed Starship to Mars by the end of 2026, carrying Tesla's Optimus humanoid robots, with human landings as early as 2029.