SatNews

Satellite Industry Intelligence Since 1983

Software Automation & Ground Systems

The Dumb Pipe Is Dead: Why Physics Is Forcing AI Into Orbit

February 11, 2026 / Business & Finance

Dispatch from SmallSat Symposium. The concept of the satellite as a simple relay, serving as little more than a shiny mirror reflecting data to control rooms in Houston or Darmstadt, is extinct. At the Computer History Museum, the panel on Autonomy and AI in Space Operations delivered a eulogy for the dumb pipe era and a baptism for the intelligent edge. The consensus among the engineers and operators on stage was absolute. We aren't automating space operations because it is trendy; we are doing it because the physics of the new orbital environment leaves us no choice.

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Silicon Valley to Aerospace: Code is the New Steel

February 10, 2026 / Business & Finance

Dispatch from SmallSat Symposium. Rockets still make a lot of noise, but the revolution visible at the SmallSat Symposium moves silently, digitally, and at the speed of code. For decades “metal benders”—those massive aerospace conglomerates that first weld titanium and then figure out the flight computer—have defined the space industry. That era is officially obsolete.

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The Space Data Layer is Coming, Just Not as Fast or as Small as You Think

February 10, 2026 / Business & Finance

Dispatch from SmallSat Symposium. Attendees at the SmallSat Symposium might have envisioned a future Space Data Layer as a seamless optical-mesh network capable of near-instant data transmission. During the symposium’s Edge of Orbit session, however, participants scrutinized the mechanics available to make that ideal materialize quickly. Attendees backed off from that theoretical end-state to debate the practical complexities and significant labor required to make this revolution operational.

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The Fractal Lab – Part II

February 2, 2026 / Data Processing & AI/ML

In Part 2 of this series, we examine the second bottleneck facing the Orbital Data Center (ODC) : Data Gravity. We will explore why moving exabytes to and from orbit is harder than processing them, and how this specific constraint fractures the market into two mutually exclusive compute types: the high-speed "Real-Time Reduction Hub" and the massive "Batch Trainer."  We will also examine other computing challenges unique to space.

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The Fractal Lab

January 29, 2026 / Data Processing & AI/ML

Before we dream of floating data centers, we must understand why the SmallSat is the only laboratory that matters. Welcome to The Fractal Lab:  a three-part series on why orbital computing succeeds or fails first at 10 kilograms, not 10,000.

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