The prototype spacecraft reached nominal operations following a three-week commissioning period after its Falcon 9 launch. Power constraints from its single onboard TPU currently cap artificial intelligence processing intervals to roughly twenty minutes per session. During initial checkouts, engineers successfully tasked the local Gemma 4 model with reporting environmental data and composing creative text. Google aims to expand the program in 2027 by deploying two upgraded satellites with inter-satellite optical links.
Key points
Google plans to launch two additional satellites in 2027 equipped with optical communicat…: Google plans to launch two additional satellites in 2027 equipped with optical communication links and expanded power systems.
Suncatcher researchers estimate SpaceX Starship must complete 1,800 flights to achieve th…: Suncatcher researchers estimate SpaceX Starship must complete 1,800 flights to achieve the cost reductions necessary for an orbital network.
The technical milestone occurs as Alphabet navigates financial pressure after AI search i…: The technical milestone occurs as Alphabet navigates financial pressure after AI search integrations slowed advertising revenue growth.
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Google Suncatcher’s prototype space data center is online and communicating with the ground after launching earlier this month alongside more than 100 other spacecraft on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
The satellite, which carries a single Google Tensor Processing Unit (TPU) and generates up to 1 kW of electricity, is intended to pave the way for future networks of close-flying satellites performing large inference workloads in orbit. However, the power demands of the TPU mean it can only turn on for about twenty minutes at a time, complicating the already tricky business of space-to-ground communications.
After a commissioning process that tested out the satellite’s subsystems over about three weeks, the spacecraft was ready to work. When engineers on the ground sent their first prompt this week, they asked the model pre-loaded onto the satellite, Google DeepMind’s Gemma 4, to write a haiku about being in space. And thus:
Blue marble below
Data streams in silent grace
Starlight feeds my core. ✨
Google said it tested the model with these space-themed limericks (they should have sent a poet?) and, perhaps more…
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