Google sends its ‘chips’ to space in a refrigerator-sized satellite; CEO Sundar Pichai says: I remember the first meeting where…

Google has sent its AI chips to space for the first time. A refrigerator-sized prototype satellite carrying four of the company’s Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) lifted off on Thursday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg, California. The launch marks the first in-orbit test of Project Suncatcher, Google’s long-term effort to find out whether AI data centres could one day run in space.

Built with Planet Labs, the satellite flew on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 rideshare mission alongside more than 100 other payloads. Project Suncatcher lead Travis Beals later confirmed the team had made contact and the satellite was “operating as expected.”