Google thinks SpaceX’s Starship has to launch 1,800 times before space data centers get off the ground

Google launched a Planet Labs satellite carrying a TPU to test orbital compute viability. The mission verifies power, cooling, and model execution in space. A peer-reviewed paper in Joule details the infrastructure requirements, noting that 1,800 Starship launches are needed before orbital data centers become economically feasible for large-scale AI workloads.