Altman and Musk trade posts on space data center feasibility
9 reported
Sam Altman and Elon Musk exchanged social media posts over the weekend, highlighting the gap between vision and reality for the space-compute business. Responding to Musk accusing him of being a scammer, Altman said, “homeboy you’re the one sellling [sic] public market investors on short-term space datacenters.” According to the source article, Altman is saying what many experts have concluded but public market investors seem to be ignoring: space data centers are not going to be a serious business anytime soon. SpaceX’s plans to launch a fleet of orbital data centers for AI inference tasks are a main driver behind the company’s 2-trillion-dollar valuation. However, subject-matter experts — including entrepreneurs behind other space data center startups, Google’s orbital compute project team, and engineers — generally agree that this will not make a big dent until much cheaper rockets and mass production of high-powered satellites are available. Musk’s answer relies on Starship, SpaceX’s huge new rocket, expected to make its 13th test flight as soon as July 16, but operational reusable flight is likely years away. SpaceX also conceded during its IPO road show that Starship may not be fully reusable in the near-term, requiring disposal of each second stage, which would hinder economical space data centers.
What’s reported
Sam Altman and Elon Musk traded social media posts over the weekend.
Musk accused Altman of being a scammer; Altman responded, “homeboy you’re the one sellling [sic] public market investors on short-term space datacenters.”
Altman’s view aligns with many experts who believe space data centers will not be a serious business anytime soon.
SpaceX’s orbital data center plans are a main driver behind its 2-trillion-dollar valuation.
Subject-matter experts say space data centers won’t make a big dent until much cheaper rockets and mass production of high-powered satellites are available.
Starship’s 13th test flight is expected as soon as July 16.
Even if both stages are recovered, operational reusable flight is likely years away, and space data center launches will likely take a back seat to NASA commitments and Starlink.
SpaceX conceded during its IPO road show that Starship may not be fully reusable in the near-term, requiring disposal of each second stage.
Musk stated, “We start flying them next year,” but the article notes that launching and manufacturing at scale is likely a question for the 2030s.
Key figures
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI (implied by context)
Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX (implied by context)
Sources: TechCrunch
