Following its historic satellite launch earlier this year, Kepler Communications says it has brought online the first commercial space data relay service, effectively creating orbital data centres.
The news: The Toronto-based company announced on Monday that its satellite constellation is now delivering real-time, space-based computing to its commercial and government customers. With this, Kepler said it has brought the first low-Earth orbit satellite system based on an optical relay network online, meaning a Canadian company has beaten out similar projects from big names like Amazon and Starlink.
From the source: “The ‘data centre in the sky’ has moved from fiction to reality!” John Ruffolo, managing partner at Maverix Private Equity and a Kepler investor, wrote in a LinkedIn post.
In his own post, Kepler co-founder and CEO Mina Mitry said the feat felt “surreal.”
“Many have tried to build this before us,” Mitry said. “We’re proud to be the first to make it a commercial reality.”
The context: Each satellite in Kepler’s network is equipped with a minimum of four optical terminals, enabling laser links between space, air, and ground assets. As Mitry described to BetaKit earlier this year, Kepler is essentially pointing a laser at an object the size of a baseball 6,500 kilometres away, and holding it steady while moving at 7.5 kilometres per second.
This relay network allows data to be processed and analyzed directly in space, rather than waiting for a downlink to Earth, effectively turning the satellites into an orbital data centre for space missions. Kepler says this reduces latency, enables the use of AI, and supports autonomous space operations.
Final thought: As demand for compute increases, companies like Google, Starlink, and Amazon are looking to launch orbital data centres to take advantage of solar power and the cold space environment. However, some experts warn the pursuit could pollute the Earth’s atmosphere, while others argue it’s simply impractical. Still, Kepler said it’s set to expand its global optical data relay network in 2028 with a new tranche of spacecraft to support customer demand and data rates up to 100 Gbps.
Feature image courtesy Kepler Communications.