There aren’t enough rockets for space data centers. Cowboy Space raised $275 million to build them.
The apparently insatiable demand for AI compute has data center entreprenuers looking to the stars. There’s a key problem: There aren’t enough rockets to put data centers in orbit around the Earth, and they’re too expensive.
Most of the players are hoping that SpaceX’s Starship — expected to make its twelfth test flight as soon as this weekend— will solve the problem. But once the vehicle is operational it may be years before it is commercially available, given SpaceX’s internal satellite business. The same is true for Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket, which failed to deliver a satellite during its third launch in April.
That leaves space data center schemes either targeting the mid 2030s, like Google Suncatcher, or preparing to start off doing edge processing tasks for space sensors, like Starcloud.
In theory, there’s a third way: “We’re standing up our own rocket program,” Baiju Bhatt, the CEO...
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