[jyl]

He says that in space there is solar power 24H a day and low earth orbit latency is low. Actually LEOs are in shadow a quarter to a third of the time. He says they’ll use the LEOs at the shadow line. Then all his space DCs have to be in the same or similar orbit, latency will rise, the orbit will get crowded by others with the same idea. Heat dissipation in space requires radiators, a lot of heat requires larger radiators. The space DCs will have to carry not only huge solar panels (calculate panel area required per MW even with higher solar intensity) but also batteries and radiators. They’ll also be disposable, no way to upgrade as new hardware emerges. It doesn’t make sense, in practical terms. It makes sense, in marketing terms. xAI is burning a huge amount of cashflow, Space X is generating some cashflow, his ownership of xAI is higher than of Space X. So he merged Space X with xAI, the combination looks better from a cashflow perspective and he has a higher ownership interest in it than he did in Space X alone. To justify this, he is talking about how space and AI need each other and he’s the only one with all the pieces. Expect lots more of this blather leading up to the IPO. Maybe they’ll send a little demonstration DC into space - others have done it, no reason they can’t send twenty GPUs and some panels up there and get a million media stories. But it’s all a scam.