In Brief Posted: 10:30 AM PDT · May 12, 2026 Rebecca Bellan Report: Google and SpaceX in talks to put data centers into orbit Google and SpaceX are in talks to launch orbital data centers in space, reports The Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the matter. …
… Cowboy Space Company, another space data center startup backed by a16z, recently decided to start building its own rockets . Jeff Bezos’ space company Blue Origin also announced plans to launch data centers into space using its New Glenn launch vehicle. …
… In SoftBank’s case, they are very, very heavily invested in data center projects here on Earth. Sam Altman is the other notable figure who’s rolled his eyes a bit at the orbital data center idea — and again, he and Elon Musk obviously have a long and complicated history together . …
… Orbital rockets typically have a booster stage that flies the vehicle to the edge of space, and a second stage that carries the payload and delivers it to orbit. Cowboy Space plans to build its data centers directly into the second stage of its rocket. …
… As AI data centers have run into opposition here on Earth, CEOs like Musk have started mulling big server racks in space powered by that 24/7 sunshine. Hammer, meet nail. Even if SpaceX is able to bring down the cost of boosting a data center into orbit, the economics are challenging at best . …
… But a dispassionate look at SpaceX’s financial plans can still tell us a lot about what they’re betting on: A business centered around orbital data centers that emerged in the last 18 months as Musk sought a vision that would unite his conglomerate ahead of its IPO. …
… More broadly, having Anthropic lined up as a customer makes it easier to believe that SpaceX’s orbital data center play might actually work . …
… The company wants to use the rapidly reusable spacecraft, which is designed to deliver 100 metric tons to Earth’s orbit, for Mars exploration and to launch orbital AI data centers into space. …
… SpaceX claims that owning the compute infrastructure and vertically integrating across the AI stack lets them “train and iterate frontier models at lower cost and higher velocity.” Another way that SpaceX might assuage investor fears about spending is by performing training and inference on orbital… …
… He’s been tight-lipped about the investment but has expressed interest in orbital data centers, and is thought to be using Relativity to launch a space telescope, Lazuili, financed by his family philanthropy, Schmidt Sciences. …