In a groundbreaking achievement for data storage and resilience, Lonestar, a pioneering company in data storage solutions, has partnered with Phison, a leading semiconductor and storage manufacturer, to launch a revolutionary data center infrastructure aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. This momentous event took place on Wednesday, with the rocket destined for the moon, marking the inception of what will be the first-ever lunar data center.
The mission includes sending Phison’s Pascari storage — advanced solid-state drives (SSDs) specifically designed for data centers — packed with critical data from Lonestar’s clients. The Falcon 9 rocket is set to land on March 4, symbolizing a significant step towards establishing a resilient data storage solution beyond Earth. The companies envision expanding this lunar data center to ultimately accommodate a staggering petabyte of storage.
Chris Stott, the founder, chair, and CEO of Lonestar, revealed to TechCrunch that the visionary idea of constructing a data center in space was conceived back in 2018, well before the current surge in AI-driven data center demand. Stott highlighted the increasing requests from customers to find secure ways to store their data off Earth, thereby shielding it from climate disasters and cyber threats. “Humanity’s most precious item, outside of us, is data,” Stott remarked. “They see data as the new oil. I’d say it’s more precious than that.”
Stott emphasized the natural synergy in partnering with Phison, especially given their previous experience in providing storage solutions for space missions, including NASA’s Perseverance Rover on Mars. Phison also offers a specialized design service known as Imagine Plus, which develops custom storage solutions tailored for unique projects. Michael Wu, the general manager and president of Phison, expressed excitement about collaborating with Lonestar, stating, “We took a standard product and were able to customize whatever they need for these products, and we launched it. So it’s a very exciting journey.”
Since their partnership began in 2021, Lonestar and Phison have been diligently working on SSD storage units optimized for space conditions. Stott noted that extensive testing was essential before the inaugural launch, as the technology must be exceptionally reliable. He stated, “This is why SSDs are so important. No moving parts. It’s remarkable technology that’s allowing us to do what we’re doing for these governments and hopefully almost every government in the world as we go forward and almost every company and corporation.”
Stott revealed that the technology has been ready for launch since 2023, with a successful test launch conducted in early 2024. The recent mission included a variety of customer data ranging from multiple governments focused on disaster recovery to a space agency testing a large language model. Notably, even the popular band Imagine Dragons contributed by sending a music video for one of their songs featured in the Starfield space game soundtrack.
Lonestar is not alone in its ambition to establish data centers in space. Another emerging competitor, Lumen Orbit, has recently come out of Y Combinator’s Summer 2024 batch, raising over $21 million and rebranding itself as Starcloud. As the demand for hardware accelerates due to AI advancements, it is anticipated that more companies will explore the potential of space-based storage solutions, which provide near-infinite storage capacity and harness solar energy—benefits that traditional Earth-bound data centers cannot offer.
Looking ahead, Lonestar aims to collaborate with satellite manufacturer Sidus Space to develop six data storage spacecraft, with plans to launch these between 2027 and 2030. Stott commented on the impressive advancements in technology since the Apollo program, stating, “This isn’t 60 years ago with the Apollo program. Apollo flight computers had 2 kilobytes of RAM and 36 kilobytes of storage. Here we are on this mission, flying 1 Gigabyte of RAM and 8 terabytes of storage with Phison Pascari. It’s tremendous.”
