Despite the hype about data centers in space, there just aren’t many GPUs up there. As this begins to change, the short-term business of orbital computing is beginning to take shape.
The largest computing cluster currently in orbit was launched by Canada’s Kepler Communications in January and features about 40 Nvidia Orin edge processors on 10 operational satellites, all linked together by laser communications links.
The company now has 18 customers and announced its newest on Monday — Sophia Space, a startup that will test software for its unique orbiting computer in the Kepler constellation.
Experts expect we won’t see large-scale data centers like those envisioned by SpaceX or Blue Origin until the 2030s. The first step will be processing data collected in orbit to improve the capabilities of space sensors used by private companies and government agencies.
Kepler doesn’t see itself as a data center company, but as infrastructure for applications in space, CEO Mina Mitry tells TechCrunch. It wants to be a layer that will provide network services for other satellites in space or for drones and aircraft in the skies below.
Sophia, on the other hand, is developing passively cooled space computers that could solve one of the key challenges for large-scale data centers in orbit: protecting powerful processors from overheating without having to build and launch heavy, expensive active cooling systems.
In the new collaboration, Sophia will upload its proprietary operating system to one of Kepler’s satellites and attempt to launch and configure it on six GPUs on two spacecraft. This type of activity is table stakes in a ground data center and this is the first time it will be attempted in orbit. Ensuring the software works in orbit will be a key risk avoidance exercise for Sophia ahead of its first planned satellite launch in late 2027.
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For Kepler, the partnership helps prove the utility of its network. Currently, it transfers and processes data uploaded from the ground or collected by hosted payloads on its own spacecraft. But as the field matures, the company expects to begin connecting with third-party satellites to provide networking and processing services.
Mitry says satellite companies are now designing future assets around this model, pointing to the benefits of offloading processing for more power-hungry sensors such as synthetic aperture radar. The US military is a key customer for such work as it develops a new missile defense system based on detecting and tracking threats from satellites. Kepler has already demonstrated a space-to-air laser link in a demonstration for the US government.
This kind of edge processing—dealing with data where it’s collected for faster response—is where orbital data centers will initially prove their worth. That vision sets Sophia and Kepler apart from established space companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin or startups like Starcloud and Aetherflux that are raising significant capital to focus on large-scale data centers with data center-style processors.
“Because we think it’s more inference than training, we want more distributed GPUs that do inference, rather than one super-powerful GPU that has the training workload capability,” Mitry told TechCrunch. “If this thing is consuming kilowatts of power and you’re only running it 10% of the time, then that’s not very useful. In our case, our GPUs are running 100% of the time.”
And when these technologies are proven on track, anything can happen. Sophia CEO Rob DeMillo points out that Wisconsin passed a ban on building data centers last week, something some lawmakers in Congress are also pushing for. Anything that limits data centers to Earth makes, in their eyes, the space-based alternative more attractive.
“There are no other data centers in this country,” thought Demillo. “It’s going to get weird from here.”
