Cowboy Space unveils Big Iron orbital data center rocket
Cowboy Space
Cowboy Space revealed Big Iron, a rocket whose upper stage becomes an orbital AI data center, and opened it to outside payloads.
what happened
Cowboy Space (formerly Aetherflux) unveiled Big Iron, an 86-meter rocket whose upper stage is designed to remain in orbit as a data center node once deployed. The vehicle uses nine methane-fueled "Clydesdale" engines generating 300,000 lbs of thrust each and carries more than 15,000 kg to sun-synchronous orbit; its orbiting upper stage measures 132 by 73 meters and carries five racks of Nvidia Vera Rubin GPUs. The company opened a "Big Iron Express" program letting government and third-party payloads needing up to a megawatt of power fly on the same vehicle, targeting a Reason-2 demonstration satellite in 2027 and Big Iron's first flight in 2028, per Payload and a Business Wire release.
why it matters
Big Iron treats the rocket itself as reusable infrastructure for in-space compute: its skin, propellant lines and structure double as the data center's radiator, coolant and solar-array deployment systems rather than being discarded after launch. Opening the vehicle to outside government and commercial payloads positions Cowboy Space as a launch option for other orbital-compute ventures racing toward the same market, not just a builder of its own satellites.
signal-to-noise
quick facts
- Companies
- Cowboy Space
- Category
- product
- Impact
- notable
- SNR
- 4 / 5
- Event date
- 2026-10-26
- Published
- 2026-10-27 05:31 UTC