Starcloud says it plans to deploy Bitcoin-mining ASICs on its second satellite by the end of the year

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Starcloud plans to achieve space-based Bitcoin mining by the end of the year and deploy ASICs on its second satellite

BlockBeats news, September 23: Starcloud, a startup invested in by Nvidia, plans to establish a space-based Bitcoin mining business by the end of this year. CEO Philip Johnston said in an interview: “We will become the first company to mine Bitcoin in space, and will deploy some Bitcoin-mining ASICs on the second spacecraft, which will launch later this year.”

Founded in 2024, Starcloud’s core goal is to send its data centers into space, using continuous solar power and radiative cooling to scale to gigawatt-level computing capacity while avoiding ground-based permitting restrictions. Starcloud-2 is the second of the company’s four planned satellites. It is positioned as its first commercial mission and will carry a GPU cluster, but the official project page does not mention Bitcoin mining or ASICs.

Johnston explained the economic rationale for shifting to Bitcoin mining: the cost per kilowatt of ASICs is approximately 30 times lower than that of GPUs. A 1-kilowatt Nvidia B200 chip costs approximately 30,000 USD, while a 1-kilowatt ASIC costs approximately 1,000 USD.

Original link https://m.theblockbeats.info/flash/368627

Key points

Starcloud plans to establish a space-based Bitcoin mining business by the end of this year.
CEO Philip Johnston said Starcloud will deploy some Bitcoin-mining ASICs on the second spacecraft scheduled to launch later this year.
Founded in 2024, Starcloud aims to send data centers into space.
Starcloud-2 is the second of four planned satellites, positioned as its first commercial mission and set to carry a GPU cluster.
The cost comparison cited in the report is: a 1-kilowatt Nvidia B200 chip costs approximately 30,000 USD, while a 1-kilowatt ASIC costs approximately 1,000 USD.
Starcloud’s official project page does not mention Bitcoin mining or ASICs.

AI-assisted interpretation

The following is analysis, separate from reported facts. Verify important claims independently.

An ASIC is a type of chip designed for a specific computing task. The report says Starcloud plans to place these chips on its second satellite to mine Bitcoin and believes their cost per kilowatt is lower than that of GPUs.

Why it matters to readers

This shows that Starcloud is exploring the use of space-based data centers for Bitcoin mining; the economic rationale given in the report is that ASIC costs per kilowatt are approximately 30 times lower than GPU costs.

The key distinction is between a “future_plan” and something already achieved: the current evidence only shows that Starcloud and its CEO have proposed a plan to launch the business by the end of the year.

Risks and unknowns

The report does not state whether the space-based Bitcoin mining business will ultimately be implemented as planned.
Starcloud’s official project page does not mention Bitcoin mining or ASICs.
The evidence does not provide a specific launch date for the second spacecraft.

Starcloud says it plans to deploy Bitcoin-mining ASICs on its second satellite by the end of the year

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