“After years of research, Project Suncatcher is scheduled to embark on its first test in orbit, launching a prototype satellite to evaluate how Google Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) perform in space,” the tech giant stated in its blog.

However, Google is not alone in this ambitious effort, as SpaceX and Starcloud are pursuing similar plans to deploy data centers in low Earth orbit, aiming to harness near-continuous sunlight to power energy-intensive AI computing and sidestep terrestrial constraints on electricity supplies.

Announced in 2025, Project Suncatcher is a long-term, research moonshot exploring whether space could one day host scalable machine learning infrastructure.

“In low Earth orbit, satellites can access near-constant sunlight, generating up to eight times more solar power than on Earth. Eventually, it could be possible to link together multiple constellations of satellites, allowing them to manage larger AI workloads while in orbit,” Google said.

This week’s mission will see Google using its rival SpaceX’s upcoming Transporter-18 rideshare ⁠launch in partnership with satellite company Planet Labs.

Google’s AI hardware, once it reaches the space, will go through tests to prove its endurance against factors like launch forces, radiation, and extreme temperatures in LEO.

“Big breakthroughs happen when you work backwards from an end goal. In our case, it’s to ensure AI’s profound benefits in key areas, from healthcare to scientific discovery, can reach everyone, far into the future. Just as early research into autonomous driving and quantum computing required years of experimentation before we got to practical systems, exploring compute in space begins with measured, deliberate steps,” Google wrote in its blog.

“As Google prepares for an early test launch and works toward its next milestone in 2027, the Project Suncatcher team discussed what we hope to learn and the engineering hurdles ahead in a new video series digging into the science behind the mission,” the Big Tech player stated further.

A rocket trip into low Earth orbit lasts about 10 minutes, during which the spacecraft experiences intense vibration and sustained acceleration loads up to 10 times the force of gravity, or g-force.

Individual components, such as the TPU chips, can experience even greater forces up to 50 to 100 g.

The Project Suncatcher team has already conducted vibration testing by intensely shaking the satellite on all three axes to mimic the frequencies of a rocket launch.

“Once the TPU chips make it to space, the level of radiation outside the Earth’s atmosphere presents another challenge to overcome. Solar events and cosmic rays can wreak havoc on electronics, so our team tested TPUs in a proton beam facility at UC Davis’s Crocker Nuclear Laboratory while running AI workloads. During the test, we monitored closely to see how errors, like a bitflip, would affect our workloads. Initial results have indicated that our Trillium TPUs hold up remarkably well and can survive a radiation total ionizing dose greater than what they would receive during a five-year space mission,” Google said.

“But some things can only be tested in space. Putting our first TPUs in orbit next week will help us gather data and insights for our future launches,” it continued.

Cooling orbital data centers is a crucial research challenge. TPUs generate a large amount of heat in a small area, which needs to be diffused safely, or the chips are at risk of overheating. However, in space, there’s no airflow.

As per the project team, in a vacuum, heat can only be diffused via radiators, which requires an entirely different approach to cooling electronics.

“We’re working on a number of different approaches for the project, including a combination of heat pipes and radiators to cool the chips. So far, our team has tested the technology in a thermal vacuum chamber that simulates both the thermal and vacuum environments in space. We’ll see how our new TPU cooling system works in space and refine our designs as we learn more,” Google said.

Future designs of Google’s satellites will each carry dozens of TPU chips while orbiting the Earth in clusters.

To maintain the bandwidth necessary to process AI, every satellite has to know both its position and where it sits relative to its neighbors.

To make sure that the satellites perform in the above-mentioned manner, Google will use laser-powered communication methods.

“The technology in space already exists, but most state-of-the-art systems are optimized for low bandwidth across large distances, whereas our lasers need to operate at very high bandwidth over extremely short distances. Maintaining the necessary connection requires extraordinary precision, similar to hitting a coin-size target from miles away while both points are in motion. We’ll test our work on this technology in 2027 when we put two satellites in orbit,” Google concluded.

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“As potential demand and data center sizes both grow, so does the complexity in forecasting,” said BloombergNEF (BNEF) Senior Associate Nathalie Limandibhratha.

The analysts, while making the prediction, used two scenarios. The experiment, however, resulted in the two models differing by 42 GW in terms of estimating the US data center electricity demand by 2030. As per the BloombergNEF, the divergence only shows growing uncertainty about the scale of the data center buildout even as the trend accelerates.

A base case modeled on US data center development BNEF considers likely to materialise showed demand from the sector of 118 GW in 2030 and 194 GW by 2035, an upward revision of 52% and 83%, respectively, from the firm’s previous outlook, published in December 2025. A second forecast developed around expected AI chip deliveries found there could be 207 GW of data center demand by 2033.

“The report highlights the difficulties in modeling the new demand. BNEF underestimated installed data-center capacity in 2025. Installed capacity topped 47 GW by the end of last year, 16% higher than BNEF’s forecast,” the agency said, while publishing its report.

“We track data centers across the US, and in the last year, we’ve added about 100 GW of project capacity. It’s not only the number of data centers and new developers that are flooding the market, but it’s also the size of these data centers,” Limandibhratha said.

That 42 GW difference, as per the BNEF analysts, is more than four times the peak load of New York City, and the tally, by 2033, will grow to 63 GW.

“Driving the uncertainty are the growing size of data centers, power availability, and the extent to which developers get more efficient in their building,” BNEF said.

“When BNEF was forecasting data center demand a year ago, a 1-GW project was considered large. In our pipeline now, we have over 70 projects that are a gigawatt in size, and even some projects that are multiple gigawatts, up to 10 GW, which is really skewing the project pipeline, and kind of ballooning and leading to the upwards revision as we get more data on how the market is evolving,” Limandibhratha remarked.

US data center demand in 2025 was almost 50 GW, she said, and it’s on pace to more than double over five years.

“It’s quite significant and rapid growth,” the senior analyst noted.

“Almost all US regions ended 2025 with more data center capacity than BNEF had anticipated, with Texas accounting for the largest difference between forecast and actual build,” the agency observed.

BNEF estimated 7.4 GW of data center capacity in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas footprint by the 2025 end. Actual demand, as per the report, has now been revised to 8.9 GW. With about 16 GW of data center demand, the PJM Interconnection, out of all the American regions, had the highest power requirement in 2025.

BNEF’s base outlook is relatively conservative, its analysts said.

“Among those 2030 estimates of installed data center capacity, there is about a 100-GW range,” Limandibhratha concluded.

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The data center will begin its operations by 2020. Its offerings include various iCloud services, according to the official Xinhua News Agency. Apple hopes to run its data center on 100% renewable energy, similar to its other data centers.

The company’s first build in China was completed last year in the southern province of Guizhou. It was established in partnership with Guizhou-Cloud Big Data, a cloud system platform. The establishment complies with the country’s new cybersecurity laws.

A report on MacRumors reads “Apple was the first foreign tech firm to announce amendments to its data storage arrangements in China to comply with a new cybersecurity law that was implemented in June, requiring foreign firms to store data within the country,” observed Reuters.

There are concerns specific to its privacy and security challenges. However, “No backdoors will be created into any of our systems,” Apple stated firmly.

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The Zenium data center, which will be renamed Equinix IS2, will further strengthen the Equinix position in Europe. As the largest metro in Turkey, Istanbul acts as a strategic gateway between Europe and Asia with critical economic and geopolitical importance. IS2 provides Equinix with key capacity and a growth path which enables the company to address growing demand for colocation and interconnection services in Turkey.

Eric Schwartz, president, EMEA, Equinix:
“The dynamic evolution of digital technology is disrupting how business is done across all industries, forcing companies to invent new, information-centric business models. These business models rely on interconnection and distributed IT architecture. As the Turkish economy continues to grow, Istanbul will become an increasingly important hub for connectivity and technology infrastructure, and this new campus will help Equinix meet this demand from customers across our global customer base.” 

Key Facts

• According to the International Monetary Fund, Turkey has the world’s 17th-largest nominal GDP and a population of approximately 80 million people. The acquisition of IS2 extends Equinix’s ability to provide Turkish businesses with the direct and secure connectivity they need to expand their global reach in new and existing markets. Equinix currently operates a single facility—IS1—in Istanbul, and has 67 International Business Exchange™ (IBX^®) data centers across Europe and the Middle East, strategically located in 18 metropolitan areas across 13 countries.
• The purchase of the Zenium business includes a total of three buildings and land. The IS2 data center building is partially fitted out; the two other buildings are shell and core and prepared for data center fit out. IS2 provides Equinix with 1,500 square meters of colocation space today with the ability to increase this to 12,000 square meters and up to 22MW of critical customer load at full build—creating the ability for a future campus environment.
• There are 10 networks, including Turk Telecom, already present at the new IS2 data center, providing network choice to the many multinationals, hyperscalers and IT vendors who use Istanbul as a regional headquarters or a gateway to markets in Asia and the Middle East. This connectivity is the foundation for cloud adoption, as enterprises continue to increase IT consumption of cloud-related services to accelerate business performance.
• According to the Global Interconnection Index, which measures and forecasts the growth of Interconnection Bandwidth, Europe is expected to grow 44% per annum to reach 1451 Tbps of installed capacity by 2020. Europe’sgrowth will be driven by a number of factors, including data sovereignty and the need for European businesses to exchange information with other businesses in-region.
• Istanbul is a key traffic route for submarine cables between Europe, Asia and Africa. These cable systems enable accelerated traffic globalization and data consumption, as well as rapid growth of cloud and online services. They are increasingly important for industries that rely on low-latency connectivity, such as the online gaming and CDNs — many of which already use Istanbul as a regional hub today.
• Equinix currently operates more than 180 IBX data centers in 44 markets, providing customers even more ways to connect with other businesses around the world on Platform Equinix™.
• Slaughter and May acted as lead external legal advisor for Equinix. RBC Capital Markets served as Zenium’s financial advisor.

Franek Sodzawiczny, CEO & founder, Zenium:
“We congratulate Equinix with this transaction, which enables us to focus on our business in Western Europe. The technological infrastructure in Turkey is advancing quickly, as businesses are requiring more interconnection to compete. This is a great opportunity and Equinix is now well positioned to drive this exciting data center business forward.”

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Posted by Richard Jenkins.

Big Data is not just about the volume of data, but also the potential strain it puts on infrastructure. Monetizing Big Data requires a substantial level of computing power, all of which is found within an extremely sensitive ecosystem. The result of this is that Big Data has a huge impact on operating costs, performance and management.

The good news is that there’s a growing awareness among senior management around the need for data center optimization, consolidation and growth. They fully understand how and why a smooth-running data center affects their top and bottom lines.

Helped in part by the increasing demands of Big Data, data centers are no longer the sole responsibility of the IT department. They have become a major concern to the executive suite. Management is asking: “How can my data center help meet the objectives of the business overall? Is the infrastructure running to its full potential? Am I effectively meeting audit and regulatory requirements? What are the strategies and technologies that can drive a risk-free, scalable infrastructure?

As hype gives way to clear, long-term data center planning, everyone involved in ensuring a fiscally smart, risk-free, high performance data center realizes that a unified approach of IT asset management, environmental monitoring, secure facilities management and cost-conscious decision making can ensure a data center meets Big Data’s demands.

They realize that, as Big Data grows, so will the number of assets needed to house and secure the data. Successfully tracking a complex network of assets is no mean feat – it is time consuming, expensive and prone to human errors. Ensuring the security of this asset inventory becomes paramount as well.

The loss of an asset greatly transcends the physical asset cost: the data contained on the asset is what’s important here. Consequently, all levels, executive and operational managers alike, agree – having real-time asset management and tracking is no longer “nice to have” it’s a “must have.”

As a result, growth versus consolidation is the unavoidable conundrum facing the CIO today. Data growth is a given, but the economically sound management of the environment for that data to become a productive part of the organization is the challenge. Big Data comes down to quality of service and owning the strategic information with which to stay ahead.

Data, however “Big”, is only as effective as the ability to derive actionable information from it. But, like anything mission critical, data needs control, has to be secure and needs to be managed if it is to be a corporate differentiator or a liability. And the data is only as good as the environment in which it works. As with many other “products”, data expects to be cared for. Heat must be managed, cooling used efficiently, liquid should be nowhere to be seen and air must have constant and equalized circulation.

Inventory management is also key in the performance of a data center and the business as a whole. Error-prone manual data collection leaves executives exposed as valuable assets are unaccounted for. There are financial, and even legal, implications to this exposure. Asset management should be an automated process, linked to the financial and operational registers and able to be measured at the click of a button.

The reality of Big Data – large scale asset growth, power requirements and fluctuations in environmental conditions – are daunting for any data center manager. Understanding factors such as rack-level temperature, humidity and differential air pressure are vital for combating unexpected issues in a Big Data environment. In turn, reducing power usage through environmental monitoring and efficient data center design clearly helps save on operational costs, improves asset lifespans and reduces resource wastage.

There will always be a fine line between realizing the business benefits of Big Data against the environmental impact. Regardless of the strategy, however, data center managers and business executives alike are urgently dealing with the demands Big Data will place on their company.

Source: www.rfcode.com

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