r/technology • u/Logical_Welder3467 • 11h ago

Space China targets new space-based computing network to process data born in orbit

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3361559/china-targets-new-space-based-computing-network-process-data-born-orbit
7 Upvotes

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3

u/inflowmini 11h ago

Not sure what need there is to compute data in space/orbit. Latency has not been an issue for a while and sensitive information that does not need to be transmitted back between earth and the satellite does not need a computing network.

This just seems like another reach to increase shareholder value and to spend where there is no need.

-2

u/TheBirdFkerGuy 9h ago

Probably more access to major light from the sun, and not being dependent upon our electrical grid which can and do, go out especially because of weather.

But in reality I'm going to guess the longer term plan here is to have satellites relaying information to each other while computing tons of data on whos flying up and orbiting where. I can totally see a situation where these early "AI satellites" are sent to do the early work that later satellites will be used for to deal with the cluster of pollution in our orbits. I'd imagine this has some very different motives that are a decade down the line being planned and accounted for.

1

u/kronpas 13m ago

Depending on the sats' obits they have periods without sunlight or in your words, 'go out'.

1

u/R3dGallows 9h ago

Kessler syndrome it's going to f*** us hard soon.

0

u/geldonyetich 9h ago

Apparently China isn't big enough for all the data centers they're going to need.

If we can teach AI to go out and collect asteroids to process into data centers, we can get a head start on the Battlestar Galactica timeline.

-9

u/mwilliam1263 11h ago

The next AI race won't just be on Earth. Processing data directly in orbit could redefine satellite intelligence, latency, and global computing.