GOOG
PL
Space, but make it a data center
Alphabet is taking its orbital AI dream out of the lab and into the sky. On Oct. 1, Google plans to launch MVP, the first experimental satellite tied to Project Suncatcher, its effort to build AI data centers in orbit.
That’s a big deal for a project that originally wasn’t supposed to reach orbit until early 2027. In other words: Google just hit the gas on a moonshot that sounds like something a sci-fi writer pitched over lunch.
Planet Labs gets pulled into the orbit
The satellite is being launched with help from Planet Labs, which originally agreed to send up two satellites for Google next year. Instead, Google fast-tracked the timeline and stuffed its own chips into a ready-made Planet Labs satellite to get this thing moving.
For investors, that means this isn’t just a cute science project. It’s a concrete read-through for Planet Labs, and a signal that Alphabet is willing to spend real money chasing an idea that could — someday — make orbital compute a thing.
The catch: space is rude to chips
Google says MVP will carry four tensor processing units and enough juice to handle simple Gemini queries from orbit. But the physical reality check is brutal: chips overheat, radiation messes with electronics, and fans are basically useless in space.
The company is testing layered cooling systems and claims chip resets can clear radiation errors in many cases. That’s promising, but still very much in the “show me” phase. Google itself is tempering expectations, saying it doesn’t expect anything usefully operational in the next few years.
Big picture: this is the kind of announcement that sounds absurd right up until it doesn’t. If Google can make orbital AI compute work, the upside is huge — but for now, it’s still one very expensive science fair project with a launch date.