Blue Origin Proposes 51,600 Orbital AI Data Satellites

Blue Origin, the aerospace company founded by Jeff Bezos, has filed a proposal with the Federal Communications Commission seeking approval to deploy a constellation of up to 51,600 satellites designed to function as data centers in orbit. The filing, submitted on March 19 and made public this week, outlines Project Sunrise as a system to perform advanced computing tasks, particularly for artificial intelligence workloads, at altitudes ranging from 500 to 1,800 kilometers above Earth.

According to the FCC document, the satellites would operate in sun-synchronous orbits with inclinations between 97 and 104 degrees, allowing near-constant exposure to sunlight for solar power generation. Each orbital plane would contain 300 to 1,000 satellites, spaced approximately three to six miles apart, and equipped with at least three types of antennas for coverage. The constellation would rely on optical inter-satellite links to minimize radio spectrum use and connect to ground stations via Blue Origin's planned TeraWave broadband network, which is still in the proposal stage.

Blue Origin argues that the project addresses the growing demand for AI computing power, which is straining...