Orbital Raises $5 Million Seed for Space Data Centers as Starship Economics Remain Key
Updated
Updated · TechCrunch · Jun 9
Orbital Raises $5 Million Seed for Space Data Centers as Starship Economics Remain Key
3 articles · Updated · TechCrunch · Jun 9
Summary
$5 million from a16z Speedrun has launched Orbital, a Los Angeles startup aiming to build space-based AI data centers under founder Euwyn Poon, who previously founded Spin and sold it to Ford.
Orbital’s pitch rests on soaring AI compute demand and the appeal of orbital power, but Poon said current Falcon 9 launch costs make the model uneconomic until SpaceX’s Starship flies regularly.
A demo flight is the near-term target: Orbital plans to fly an Nvidia Blackwell chip on a partner satellite to test radiation shielding and thermal management, then launch its first processing spacecraft in 2028 with Nvidia Space-1 Vera Rubin-class GPUs.
The company ultimately wants 10,000 satellites delivering 100 kilowatts each for roughly 1 gigawatt of distributed compute, entering a field where Starcloud already has a GPU in orbit and Blue Origin and Cowboy Space are pursuing rival approaches.
Andrew Chen said a project like this could take a decade and more than $5 billion, underscoring how SpaceX’s progress and AI-market enthusiasm have widened venture appetite for capital-intensive space bets.
As rivals launch GPUs now, is success in the space AI race about speed to market or waiting for the perfect rocket?
If the world can't produce enough AI chips, do space data centers solve the right problem or just move the bottleneck to orbit?
With cosmic rays and extreme heat, can orbital AI ever be reliable enough for critical tasks without technicians on call?
2026 Space Data Centers: Key Players, Economic Hurdles, and the Geopolitical Stakes
Overview
In 2026, the space sector rapidly gained attention as a major area for investment and innovation, driven by the ambitious pursuit of off-planet data solutions. Starcloud emerged as a leading player in orbital data centers, evolving from a Y Combinator graduate to a unicorn company with hardware already in orbit. The company secured a landmark $170 million Series A funding round, which validated orbit as a viable location for compute infrastructure and propelled Starcloud to a $1.1 billion valuation. Starcloud’s achievements highlight the growing momentum and confidence in space-based computing as a transformative new frontier.