Starcloud plans to launch its second satellite later this year, officially commencing its attempt to mine Bitcoin from space. The NVIDIA-backed startup aims to deploy high-performance computing equipment in Earth's orbit, becoming the world's first company to achieve Bitcoin mining in space. This move is a key step in its strategy to build a large-scale orbital data center.
The company launched the project in early 2024, with the initial intention of alleviating the ground-based energy pressure brought about by the rapid development of artificial intelligence. Its first satellite was successfully launched into orbit last November, carrying powerful NVIDIA H100 GPUs, marking the first time such high-performance GPUs have been operated in space. Building on this success, Starcloud is further expanding its plans for in-orbit computing infrastructure.
Starcloud's design concept relies on the near-limitless solar energy resources in the space environment. By deploying a large satellite constellation consisting of approximately 88,000 satellites, the company hopes to build an orbital computing network that relies entirely on solar power, thereby avoiding additional burden on the Earth's power grid. Compared to ground-based data centers, this model is expected to achieve more stable and sustainable computing power output.
Although current mainstream Bitcoin mining equipment (ASICs) have a much lower cost per unit power than high-end GPUs—ASICs cost about $1,000 per kilowatt, while NVIDIA B200 and other graphics cards can reach tens of thousands of dollars—Starcloud believes that in the orbital environment, the flexibility and versatility of GPUs make them more suitable for complex computing tasks. In addition, Bitcoin mining currently consumes approximately 20 gigawatts of electricity globally per year. If some of this computing power can be migrated to space, it will significantly reduce the pressure on the Earth's energy systems.
At the same time, the industry is also exploring cross-planetary Bitcoin transaction transmission mechanisms. Tech entrepreneurs Jose E. Puente and Carlos Puente have proposed an interstellar transaction system based on optical communication, intending to use existing satellite networks such as NASA or Starlink to transmit transaction data, and designing a dedicated timestamp protocol to cope with deep space communication delays. However, research indicates that direct mining on planets such as Mars is still unrealistic due to the excessive communication delays between planets, making it difficult to meet the response speed required for blockchain consensus.
In the future, if orbital data center technology matures, it may not only reshape the energy landscape of Bitcoin mining but also open up a new track for computing power services in the space economy.