SpaceX CEO Elon Musk Aims for Late 2027 Orbital Data Center Launch

According to CNBC, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is targeting a late 2027 launch for orbital data centers, while other industry watchers say meaningful scale is more likely in the 2030s. Neuberger portfolio manager Evelyn Chow said the concept is a next-decade event and said significant satellite launches over the next four to five years, along with a buildout of connectivity, would be needed before true scale becomes practical. Blaine Curcio, founder of Orbital Gateway Consulting, called the 2030s timeline a fair assessment, but said SpaceX has proved investors wrong before. Chow said cooling is a major hurdle because space conditions differ from terrestrial liquid cooling and systems must also withstand radiation. Curcio said rapidly advancing GPUs could leave a space-based data center obsolete within a couple of years after launch. Transcelestial CEO and cofounder Rohit Jha said high-volume data transfer back to Earth remains a key challenge and said orbital data centers could take another five to seven years to reach hyperscale, which would likely require nuclear power.