Lunar South(Tycho) lu-south-1
The first data center in space is not just the logical next step; it has a solid business case.
In a recent blog post, AWS unveiled a new business segment called “Aerospace and Satellite Solutions” (yes, ASS). One of the new segment's exciting targets is to “Launch new services that process space data on Earth and in orbit.” A cloud above the clouds is already in motion, and here’s why you should prepare yourself for the opportunities it brings.
Part 1: Follow the data trail.
1. We generate a lot of data.
Humans were offloading their knowledge to external mediums from the beginning of time, from Moses and the Tablets of Stone on mount Sinai to toothpaste experiments on TikTok. The process was dramatically accelerated during the information era. The ridiculous amounts of data and compute power needed to crunch pushed the industry into cloud computing with their monstrous data centers.
2. We do it in space as well.
Over the last decades, the same process is happening in space. The amount of data generated in space is huge, and with the commercialization of space only at its first steps, the growth rate is expected to explode. NASA alone is planning to store ±250 PB on its archives by 2025. While the sizes are still small in comparison to earth, the trend is clear.
3. Let the compute follow the data.
Humanity is generating data on earth and in space but processes it almost entirely on earth. All the data from space has to be transmitted back to earth, be stored here, and processed. The next logical step is bringing the compute power closer to the data, the same way we do it on earth.
4. Wait, what?
Why not just improve the link to earth? Sound more like the next logical step. Improvements to the data link are being made all the time. Harnessing laser technologies, better service of ground stations like AWS Ground Station, and opening the data bottleneck, to name some. All this can take us up to a certain point. But the trend will keep growing.
5. A use case to the rescue.
Satellite imagery is a good example of a process that can benefit a lot from the transition to space-based compute. Transmitting all the raw data that was captured in space is costly and slow. After receiving all the data on earth, it must be heavily manipulated and standardized to be ready for analysis. Let’s say I want to identify ship routes on the Atlantic ocean. Instead of downloading all the raw imagery data to earth and manipulating it to identify the ships, I can run manipulation code (be it an ML model or any other logic) in space and:
- Save 99.999% of the “just sea, nothing to see” imagery data being downloaded.
- I can also store the “interesting” images in space and fetch them only when needed.
Maxar Technologies is an example of a company that moved all of its archives data, compute, and uses AWS Groud-Station for accessing its satellite. I believe that when available, they will move their compute to space as well.
Part 2: Now, follow the money trail.
Launching low, landing high.
Money is pouring into space, and the market cap is constantly growing. Due to the reduction in space launch cost over the last years, there is a surge in the number of launches. Most of them are LEO (Low Earth Orbit). We are witnessing the rise of the large LEO constellations (LLC). LLCs are made of hundreds to thousands of satellites. Most of them aim to provide fast global communication — like Elon Musk’s Starlink and Amazon’s Project Kuiper — or earth observations¹. But why stop there? Why not use LLCs for data centers²?
Say IAAS to space.
So when will we see an end-to-end data-center infrastructure-as-a-service (IAAS) in space? The short answer is that we already do. We see it for specific applications: Spacebelt provides a secure out-of-the-grid, air-gapped data center located on a grid of LEO satellites, completely disconnected from the internet. Another solution in this niche is ConnectX, which stores digital currency wallets and private keys in orbit. We also see some more general solutions: OrbitEdge is offering Edge computing on its LEO constellation, and Loft Orbital is offering to host almost every payload on their standardized bus.
Going back to the opening of this post, the real change will come with the big players. In their endless search for new markets, it won’t be long before you can spin up an EC2 instance in the “lunar-south-1" region on your AWS account. So say yes to space. It’s in the region.
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[1] G. CurziOrc, D. Modenini, and P. Tortor, “Large Constellations of Small Satellites: A Survey of Near Future Challenges and Missions”
[2] H. Huang, S. Guo, and K. Wang, “Envisioned wireless big data storage for low earth-orbit satellite-based cloud”