Alphabet’s Google is in talks with Elon Musk’s SpaceX for a rocket launch deal as the search giant seeks to set up orbital data centers in space, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the discussions.
According to the report, Google is also in talks about a possible agreement with other rocket launch companies.
SpaceX and Google did not respond immediately 🏽 to Reuters’ requests for comment.
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A partnership with Google would mark the second time Musk has made peace with an AI rival he has publicly criticized, ahead of a crucial and widely anticipated IPO for SpaceX.
Billionaire Elon Musk helped launch OpenAI in 2015 as a counterweight to Google’s AI ambitions, following disagreements with co-founder Larry Page over AI security. Now, SpaceX and Google find themselves in a race towards the same frontier, competing to take AI data centers 🏽 to space.
The development of space-based orbital data centers is one of the key drivers behind SpaceX’s initial public offering, as the venture is expected to require high capital investment and be technologically challenging.
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Last week, Anthropic agreed to use the entire computing capacity of SpaceX’s Colossus 1 facility in Memphis and expressed interest in working with the rocket company to develop several gigawatts of space-based orbital data centers.
Google is pushing the idea of space data centers with Project Suncatcher, a research initiative to connect solar-powered satellites equipped with its Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) into an orbital AI cloud. The company plans to launch an initial prototype with partner Planet Labs around 2027.
