3 ms·
Hard to not look at the crazy valuation of SpaceX and not see a correlation. At some point, something's gotta give.
by p-o 3mo ago
Hard to not look at the crazy valuation of SpaceX and not see a correlation. At some point, something's gotta give.
- idontwantthis 3mo agoUnfortunately, their valuation has almost nothing to do with starlink revenues. It’s almost entirely speculative oribital data centers that have not been invented yet. They could double their starlink revenues and it would have no impact on the valuation.
- _doctor_love 3mo agoWasn't it Jeff Skilling who once waxed poetical about hypothetical future value?
- croes 3mo agoEven if invented, what is the advantage of orbit data centers?
- 0cf8612b2e1e 3mo agoThe best I have heard: It makes you fully independent of the terrestrial energy grid. There is also some nebulous freedom from governmental authority possibilities. Both of which strike me as poor arguments. We are in a short term energy crunch. I expect within five years that most of the energy problems will be resolved and the eye watering financials of launching a GPU into space will look absurd Governments also do not like to cede authority, so I find it hard to believe that they will not claim jurisdiction over any business operating within their borders (all of those ground stations).
- bakies 3mo agoif you launch enough solar panels to power the data center into space, its easier to put them on the ground. Yeah there's some less power, but also have six times the lifespan so just build twice as many and it's still more efficient. Getting land in Texas can't be that hard.
- idontwantthis 3mo agoYou could build them at the South Pole, or at the bottom of the ocean and it will still be easier than putting them in space. Just think of maintenance. Oh no, your power supply burned out Space: Welp, that entire data center node is dead now. Antarctica: OK, put a technician on a modified C-130.
- amanaplanacanal 3mo agoI think the idea is easy energy availability and no push back from the locals. Those both seem to be to be fairly simple to solve on the ground compared to the unsolved issues doing it in orbit.
- scottyah 3mo agoThe Laws of Physics are much easier to build around than the Laws of Men.
- largbae 3mo agoRegulatory problems are doing the heavy lifting. Sure power is "free", if you can launch it, station keep it and cool it and if the data services are useful at the modem latencies of geosync and lunar orbits. But if datacenter projects can't be built/powered fast enough due to permitting, this is an expensive workaround.
- bakies 3mo agoThe orbits are lower than that. Not that it changes the point.
- ben_w 3mo agoAlso, the lifetime of the panels on the ground is longer by about the same multiple as the power advantage of going to space, so if you're limited by the size of your photovoltaic factory, there's no reason to go to space.
- TheOtherHobbes 3mo agoNo planning restrictions. Throw up as many as you can afford to build and launch. No grid strain because they're self-powered. And they're likely out of national jurisdictions, so you can generate all the porn you want. Technologically? Maaaaaybe a slight ping time reduction in certain configurations compared to terrestrial fiber, because even with multiple hops lasers can still be faster than fiber. Super-expensive, questionably economic way to do it though.
- whatisthiseven 3mo agoMight as well base the valuation on SpaceX getting a colony to Alpha Centauri and then billions living there and needing regular SpaceX shuttle services from Sol. Then we could properly value the IPO in the quadrillions. (I know you know this is ridiculous. But investors clearly are riding high on the tulip mania).
- epistasis 3mo agoIn the meantime, until Musk comes up with the next big "idea" to switch to, all the current revenue levers need to be pushed to max to try to make it to that next stage, since public companies demand revenue every quarter. A lot of their revenue is also from renting out GPUs to more productive AI companies, so depending on how long that game can keep on going (getting access to GPUs before other companies), it could last for a while too.
- prymitive 3mo agoHere’s an idea: Musk launches a ton of orbital gpus but in reality it’s just an empty shell and real gpus sit in unused grok data centres. How would we even know?
- idontwantthis 3mo agoThat's actually the best take I've heard. It's like Amazon faking-it-till-they-didnt-make it with cashierless grocery stores.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- arijun 3mo agoI disagree, but not for the reason you think. They need to fund R&D to justify their high valuation. A new stock issue would decrease the valuation, and they will have a difficult time borrowing the money with their poor bond valuations. So this will (maybe) slow the bleed. Musk doesn't need to deliver to keep valuation up. We've seen him doing pretty well stringing people along indefinitely with "3 months maybe, 6 months definitely" self driving capabilities.
- idontwantthis 3mo agoIt’s not an opinion it’s laid out clearly in the prospectus. Spacex is not a space company. It is a 2 trillion dollar AI company with a small launch business and a smaller ISP.
- arijun 3mo agoI am not disagreeing with that. I am saying that having enough revenue is necessary to keep the house of cards standing.
- downrightmike 3mo ago[dead]
- ZiiS 3mo agoIt is possible they delayed this rise as they didn't want bad news in the run-up to going public; but the is absolutely no way this can touch their fundamental numbers.