AI and Smallsats Are Moulding Space Investment’s Future

It was only two years ago that ChatGPT exploded onto the scene. Some like to say it hasn’t reached its potential, that some of the predictions around its growth were overstated. And maybe they were, but that doesn’t remotely mean that its effect hasn’t been transformative, and won’t continue to be. There’s a reason that entire countries, like the UAE, have put AI at the centre of their strategy for national growth.

Those of us who work in and around the space sector are under no illusions about what AI can achieve. We’re seeing the transformation happen before our very eyes. Already, smallsats were going to have a huge effect on life here on Earth, driving forward productivity while helping us to address global challenges like the climate crisis. Combined with AI, the prospects are tantalising. Both AI and space have the same basic thesis: bringing enhanced productivity and efficiency to the global economy. That’s why it’s not an exaggeration to say that everyone stands to benefit.

Innovations in design and movement

Thanks to generative AI, the lengthy and complicated process of designing and building satellites has been reduced dramatically. We can now teach GenAI how to code highly sophisticated software that enables the printing of three-dimensional spacecraft. Once launched, AI helps to calculate the satellite’s trajectory, allowing for real-time adjustments that optimise its fuel use and minimise its travel time. AI’s involvement will ensure that such a satellite achieves and maintains the correct orbit for its mission with next to no human intervention. And that extends to helping satellites to avoid collisions either with other satellites or space debris. Though vanishingly rare, it would otherwise have to be dealt with exclusively by people on the ground. In time, thanks to advances in space situational awareness, satellites will be able to detect and evade other objects with minimum human involvement. They’ll be able to recognise anomalies and detect faults by themselves if they sustain damage in some other way or begin to suffer disrepair.

The communication challenge

All of this reduces costs. But the biggest costs are incurred due to satellite communication. At present, many of the functions satellites perform involve the transmission of information from the satellite to Earth (or to another satellite, and then to Earth), and this process is costly, making any innovation that either improves the speed of transmission or reduces the amount of information that needs to be sent valuable. If, for example, satellites had the capacity to process the data they capture, much of which is of poor quality or worthless, then the cost savings would be great. If satellites could also capture better-quality data in the first place – through better imaging, for example – then likewise. And thanks to AI, the development of both capacities is underway. Imaging is improving. Data-processing is fast becoming a reality. This will be of enormous value to those who require reliable, timely information, such as the wildfire data supplied by companies like Kayrros, and the disaster relief services supplied by companies like ICEYE. It is also immensely valuable to the growing number of people and societies who rely on rapid-response disaster reliefs at a time of extreme climate and geopolitical volatility.

A golden age of growth and investment

From the standpoint of the investor, these changes are significant, because space is already the backbone of the global economy. The World Economic Forum has predicted that the global space ecosystem will reach $1.8trn in value by 2035. Modelling from Globant, meanwhile has also shown that the full adoption of current satellite technologies (which, needless to say, do not make full use of AI) by 2030 would give the world the means to reach net zero 10 years ahead of schedule. As AI develops, it increasingly affects everything to do with satellites: its computation, its data-processing, design and creation. Functionality goes up, costs go down. Satellites, in turn, provide more data for AI. This is great news for investors who understand the sector deeply and take a strategic approach.

Both AI and small satellites were changing the world independently. Now, they’re coming ever-closer together in a meaningful way. That bodes well not just for those concerned with the progress of either and both, nor just for those looking to invest in space, but for people on the ground as well. Downstream from those developments are increases in global productivity, social and cultural progress, climate mitigation and resilience, and much more that we can’t yet predict.

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Bogdan Gogulan is CEO at NewSpace Capital

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The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of AlphaWeek or its publisher, The Sortino Group