Irrespective of one's feelings about Elon himself, SpaceX is pretty special, and few people who know about this sector would disagree.
They've revolutionised launching things (now including humans) into space through building cheaper rockets and then pioneering landable and reusable rockets. They've done this for a relatively low cost and pretty quickly, vs. their competitors who spend more money and time doing less impressive things. They've probably reduced the cost to orbit per kg by ~10x.
Regarding spending (and as with Tesla) don't confuse the cost of ongoing R&D with general running costs. Their launch business with Falcon 9/Heavy is profitable; but the R&D to get to where they are (with those reusable landing rockets, engine improvements, Dragon, Crew Dragon, drone ships, etc.) cost a lot. And they're now spending even more to develop Starship and a new generation of engines (Raptor) which will probably drop the cost to orbit by at least another order of magnitude.
They've revolutionised launching things (now including humans) into space through building cheaper rockets and then pioneering landable and reusable rockets. They've done this for a relatively low cost and pretty quickly, vs. their competitors who spend more money and time doing less impressive things. They've probably reduced the cost to orbit per kg by ~10x.
Regarding spending (and as with Tesla) don't confuse the cost of ongoing R&D with general running costs. Their launch business with Falcon 9/Heavy is profitable; but the R&D to get to where they are (with those reusable landing rockets, engine improvements, Dragon, Crew Dragon, drone ships, etc.) cost a lot. And they're now spending even more to develop Starship and a new generation of engines (Raptor) which will probably drop the cost to orbit by at least another order of magnitude.