Everyone has been talking about datacenters in space. Interviews given by Elon Musk in the past few months have spent lots of time on orbital compute: “Five years from now, my prediction is we will launch and be operating every year more AI in space than the cumulative total on Earth… I would expect to be at least, sort of five years from now, a few hundred gigawatts per year of AI in space and rising.” Elon Musk on Dwarkesh Podcast, February 2026. Furthering space-based compute was also one of the stated motivations behind the merger of xAI into SpaceX (as a ‘reorganization of entities under common control’), and is a key part of SpaceX’s plans to go public, as stated in their S-1 filing on 20 May 2026.

Full analysis : A deep dive into the case for data centers in space, as SpaceX prepares to go public: Elon Musk’s claims, the wider debate, power supply issues, costs, and more.