SpaceX
SpaceX test fires twice-flown Falcon 9 for world’s first commercial Moon mission
Likely to be the third orbital-class launch for the booster in question, SpaceX’s next launch – led by primary customer Pasifik Satelit Nusantara (PSN) – has the potential to lay claim to multiple major spaceflight “firsts”, ranging from the first time a twice-flown Falcon 9 has launched on the East Coast to the world’s first attempt to land a commercial spacecraft on another planetary body – the Moon, in this case.
SpaceX has completed the final critical test milestone of the mission’s flight-proven Falcon 9, filling the rocket with propellant and successfully static firing the booster on the evening of February 18th. According to SpaceX, all remains on schedule for a February 21st launch attempt from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) Launch Complex 40 (LC-40), with liftoff currently targeted for 8:45 pm EDT (01:45 UTC).
Static fire test of Falcon 9 complete—targeting February 21 launch of Nusantara Satu from Pad 40 in Florida.
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) February 19, 2019
If all goes well, the launch of PSN satellite Nusantara Satu (formerly PSN-6; translation: “One Archipelago”) – carrying two copassenger spacecraft – could be an immensely significant moment for commercial spaceflight. Thanks to the support of rideshare provider Spaceflight Industries, those two passengers will be sent to high-energy geostationary orbits long relegated to dedicated launches of extremely large satellites, typically weighing multiple tons. While one could fairly argue that this is not the first time in history that a geostationary rideshare launch has occurred, it is almost certainly the first time that such a mission profile has been attempting for a commercial customer.
We are going to the moon! A 3D engine mount from RUAG Space will be the first 3D printed part on the moon. Our 3D part will support landing and lift off of Lunar Lander from @TeamSpaceIL. Congrats to our incredible engineers! pic.twitter.com/AbFZFD7GPB
— Peter Guggenbach (@PeterGuggenbach) February 11, 2019
In this case, that commercial entity is the Israeli company SpaceIL in support of the world’s first commercially-developed Moon lander, a ~600 kg (1300 lb) spacecraft known as Beresheet (Hebrew for “In the beginning”). Designed by SpaceIL and constructed by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), the craft has since been installed atop PSN-6 and encased in Falcon 9’s payload fairing along with one much smaller copassenger, an Air Force Research Laboratory-funded (AFRL) microsat known as “S5”. The latter spacecraft weighs roughly 60 kg (130 lb) and is an experiment designed to determine whether small satellites can be used in geostationary orbit (GEO), with S5 focusing on cataloging and tracking GEOsats.
-
- PSN-6, an SSL-built communications satellite weighing several thousand kilograms, arrived in Florida roughly 10 days ago. (SSL)
-
- The Air Force Research Lab’s S5 smallsat. (Blue Canyon)
-
- Beresheet is seen here prior to the spacecraft’s flight from Israel to Florida. (SpaceIL/IAI)
-
- After arriving in Florida, Spaceflight was tasked with integrating Beresheet with PSN-6. (SpaceIL/Spaceflight)
Spaceflight Industries aims for new market creation
Shepherded by rideshare industry leader Spaceflight, the PSN-6 rideshare – known by the company as GTO-1 – has the potential to open up a new and highly useful realm of spaceflight previously all but closed off to customers lacking tens of millions of dollars for launch costs. While it’s unclear how exactly Spaceflight worked with SSL and/or PSN to make it happen, the mission profile and its potential are both fascinating and complex.
“What we’re doing with [GTO-1] is really cool, cause this is a type of mission that hasn’t really been available [commercially] in the past – taking a ride all the way to GEO and then separating in GEO as an independent spacecraft . . . We’re really excited about testing the market and proving – really, making – a new market here with the GEO [and GTO] rideshare.” – Ryan Olcott, Spaceflight (Jan. 2019)
In a late-January interview with Spaceflight’s Mission Director Ryan Olcott, the senior manager was audibly excited about the future potential of Spaceflight’s new GTO (and GEO) offerings and the many ways that they could change the game for a number of companies and startups with far smaller but no less capable spacecraft. Including startups Astranis and Terran Orbital and industry stalwart SSL, interest in small geostationary satellites has never been higher, and a number of pathfinder missions in 2020 and 2021 – if successful or at least promising – could mark a paradigm shift for the geostationary satellite communications industry as a whole. Often sized perfectly (100-500 kg) for a handful of in-development smallsat launch vehicles like Relativity’s Terran, Firefly’s Beta, and ABL Space’s RS-1, it will likely be several years before those new rockets are capable of reliably supporting these much smaller launches, leaving rideshare missions as the only real route for interested customers until the early to mid 2020s.
-
- Astranis’ “MicroGEO” offering compared beside one of the largest geostationary satellite buses. (Astranis)
-
- The change in scale between ITS, BFR, and BFR 2018 is significant. (Teslarati)
-
- A render of Spaceflight’s SSO-A dispensers attached to Falcon 9’s second stage.
-
- Falcon 9 B1046 lifts off for the third time with Spaceflight’s SSO-A rideshare mission. (Pauline Acalin)
In the process of undertaking this milestone geostationary rideshare, Spaceflight had to design, build, and test custom hardware needed to protect the AFRL’s S5 spacecraft on its multi-week ridealong from geostationary transfer orbit to PSN-6’s geostationary orbit destination, as well as unique mounting hardware needed to load SpaceIL’s Beresheet spacecraft atop the main satellite host. In fact, GTO-1’s mission profile is impressively complex, requiring multiple mission-specific maneuvers and separation events to detach Beresheet shortly after the entourage separates from Falcon 9, carry S5 to a geostationary graveyard orbit (GEO + ~300 km) to separate Spaceflight’s custom hardware, return to a lower orbit to deploy the Air Force satellite, and finally insert PSN-6 into its final operational orbit.
“We actually have to open up our adapter system to allow the [AFRL S5] spacecraft to come out, so we have about a half-day time window that we’re aiming for where we will separate the top off of our cone adapter system and then drop [the orbit] back down a little bit [because we can’t drop that junk off in GEO – you have to use the GEO graveyard slot].” – Ryan Olcott, Spaceflight
“GTO is pretty cool because you can do all sorts of positive C3 missions [to] Lagrange points or just about [anywhere] in the solar system you want to go to … With SpaceIL, potentially in the future [Spaceflight will also] be able to partner with them to bring things to the Moon if they’ve got customers that want to bring payloads to the Moon.” – Ryan Olcott, Spaceflight
The fact that the first primary passenger (by weight) of GTO-1 is a mission as groundbreaking as the commercial Beresheet Moon lander is also by no means a coincidence according to Ostello, a feeling that was rapidly backed up by an agreement between IAI and European company OHB to potentially use Beresheet-derived landers to deliver European payloads to the Moon. Ostello expressed a similar interest and optimism a few weeks prior to that announcement. While not directly involving Spaceflight, the fact that IAI (Beresheet’s manufacturer) is interested in producing more landers for other customers essentially opens the door for Spaceflight or other commercial or governmental entities to purchase future landers for customer payloads or arrange their launch to the Moon.
Second time’s the third-time charm
Set to launch on an unspecified Falcon 9, process of elimination (i.e. which boosters are in Florida) implies that PSN-6/GTO-1 will feature either Falcon 9 booster B1047 or B1048, two flight-proven boosters with no know missions assigned that are also known to be in Cape Canaveral. B1047 last launched the Es’hail-2 satellite in mid-November, while B1048 completed its second launch (from California) in early October before shipping to Florida for unknown reasons. With B1048 situated in 39A’s hangar, the lack of any reports of a booster moving from 39A to 40 suggest that B1047 was the Falcon 9 that successfully conducted its third on-pad static fire last night.
Shortly after launch, the Falcon 9 booster will make its way to drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) – located ~650 km (400 mi) off the coast of Florida – for what will be the second time ever that SpaceX has successfully launched and landed the same Falcon 9 booster three times, following on the heels of B1046’s third launch last December. SpaceX fairing recovery vessel Mr. Steven also arrived at Port Canaveral last week after a nearly 8000 km (5000 mi) journey from Port of Los Angeles, raising the possibility of his first attempt at a fairing catch on the East Coast.
Check out Teslarati’s newsletters for prompt updates, on-the-ground perspectives, and unique glimpses of SpaceX’s rocket launch and recovery processes!
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s TERAFAB project: Everything you need to know
The CEO has hinted heavily for several quarters that it would probably need to produce its own computing power to stay up to speed on the demand it is facing for its projects. It is now taking matters into its own hands.
On Sunday, Elon Musk formally made TERAFAB official—a groundbreaking $20-25 billion joint venture uniting Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI, three of the world’s richest man’s most significant and powerful ventures.
Musk described the project as “the most epic chip building exercise in history by far.”
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
The initiative aims to produce over one terawatt of AI compute annually, dwarfing the global industry’s current output of roughly 20 gigawatts per year. Musk framed the effort as “the next step towards becoming a galactic civilization,” positioning it as essential for scaling humanity into a multi-planetary species.
The Need for TERAFAB
Existing chip suppliers such as TSMC, Samsung, and Micron cannot expand quickly enough to meet the explosive demand for AI hardware.
We’re building TERAFAB to close the gap between today’s chip production & the future’s demand – a future among the stars.
Join us → https://t.co/512DIlqNgY pic.twitter.com/ATr0e0pRDJ
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 22, 2026
Musk explained the situation clearly:
“We’re very grateful to our existing supply chain… but there’s a maximum rate at which they’re comfortable expanding. We either build the Terafab or we don’t have the chips, and we need the chips, so we build the Terafab.”
The CEO has hinted heavily for several quarters that it would probably need to produce its own computing power to stay up to speed on the demand it is facing for its projects. It is now taking matters into its own hands.
Chip Types and Production Goals
The facility will manufacture two specialized chip families, according to the presentation:
- Edge-inference AI5 and AI6 processors optimized for Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robots and Full Self-Driving systems in vehicles and Robotaxis
- High-power D3 chips hardened for space environments
Musk outlined annual output targets, which are between 100 and 200 gigawatts of terrestrial compute for robotics, supporting Musk’s vision of producing 1-10 billion Optimus units per year, and the majority (80%) of chips dedicated to orbital AI data centers. Overall, TERAFAB aims to produce 100-200 billion custom AI and memory chips each year.
Scale and Strategy
The size of the TERAFAB project will be remarkable, as Musk indicated after the presentation that the entire Gigafactory Texas campus would not be large enough to fit the needs of the project. In fact, Musk said it would be around 100 million square feet in size, the equivalent of 15 Pentagons or three Central Parks.
Yes, the one in New York City.
Construction will begin with an “advanced technology fab” on the Giga Texas campus in Austin, enabling rapid iteration: design a chip, fabricate lithography masks, produce and test wafers, all within days.
However, the full-scale TERAFAB requires thousands of acres and over 10 gigawatts of power, far exceeding what Giga Texas can accommodate. Musk stated:
“We couldn’t possibly fit the Terafab on the GigaTexas campus. It will be far bigger than everything else combined there.”
Multiple large sites are currently under consideration, but this will need a sprawling land mass to get started.
The sheer scale of TERAFAB is going to be insane.
Elon said it wouldn’t be suitable for anywhere on Giga Texas property because it’s too big:
“We couldn’t possibly fit the Terafab on the GigaTexas campus. It will be far bigger than everything else combined there.
Several… pic.twitter.com/79GbhNNuf4
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) March 23, 2026
Key Applications
TERAFAB will be a crucial part of the development of some of Tesla’s most valuable projects, including Optimus and data center development, especially from an orbital standpoint. For that reason, we will break this down into Terrestrial and Orbital applications:
- Terrestrial: Powers autonomous vehicle fleets and billions of Optimus robots performing physical labor
- Orbital: Starship will launch massive AI satellite constellations, starting with 100-kilowatt “Mini” units, and scaling to larger Megawatt models, creating the world’s largest data center in low-Earth orbit.
Space-based advantages include five times greater solar irradiance, efficient vacuum heat rejection, and freedom from terrestrial grid constraints (U.S. electricity generation totals just 0.5 terawatts). Musk emphasized the principle:
“Quantity has a quality all its own.”
We wrote about SpaceX’s recent filing with the FCC for 1 million orbital data center plans.
Strategic Vision
TERAFAB represents vertical integration at an unprecedented scale, combining AI hardware, robotics, and orbital infrastructure.
Musk described the project as “the final missing piece of the puzzle.” With production ramping toward 2027, TERAFAB is set to accelerate an era of abundance, transforming science fiction into reality and positioning Musk’s companies at the forefront of galactic-scale innovation.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI unveiled TERAFAB, a $25B chip factory targeting one terawatt of AI compute annually.
Elon Musk took the stage over the weekend at the defunct Seaholm Power Plant in Austin, Texas, to officially unveil TERAFAB, a $20-25 billion joint venture between Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI that he described as “the most epic chip building exercise in history by far.” The announcement marks the most ambitious infrastructure bet Musk has made since Gigafactory 1 in Sparks, Nevada, and it fuses three of his companies into a single, vertically integrated AI hardware machine for the first time.
TERAFAB is designed to consolidate every stage of semiconductor production under one roof, including chip design, lithography, fabrication, memory production, advanced packaging, and testing. At full capacity, the facility would scale to roughly 70% of the global output from the current world’s largest semiconductor foundry from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC).
Elon Musk’s stated goal is one terawatt of computing power annually, split between Tesla’s AI5 inference chips for vehicles and Optimus robots, and D3 chips built specifically for SpaceXAI’s orbital satellite constellation.
Tesla Terafab set for launch: Inside the $20B AI chip factory that will reshape the auto industry
The logic behind the merger of these three entities is rooted in a supply chain crisis Musk has been signaling for over a year. At Tesla’s Q4 2025 earnings call, he warned investors that external chip capacity from TSMC, Samsung, and Micron would hit a ceiling within three to four years. “We’re very grateful to our existing supply chain, to Samsung, TSMC, Micron and others,” Musk acknowledged at the Terafab event, “but there’s a maximum rate at which they’re comfortable expanding.” Building in-house was, in his framing, not a strategic option, but a necessity.
The space angle is where the announcement becomes genuinely unprecedented. Musk said 80% of Terafab’s compute output would be directed toward space-based orbital AI satellites, arguing that solar irradiance in space is roughly 5x greater than at Earth’s surface, and that heat rejection in vacuum makes thermal scaling viable. This directly feeds the SpaceXAI vision, which is betting that within two to three years, running AI workloads in orbit will be cheaper than doing so on the ground. The satellites, powered by constant solar energy, would effectively turn low Earth orbit into the world’s largest data center.
Will Tesla join the fold? Predicting a triple merger with SpaceX and xAI
Historically, this announcement threads together every major Musk initiative of the past two years: the xAI-SpaceX merger, Tesla’s $2.9 billion solar equipment talks with Chinese suppliers, the 100 GW domestic solar manufacturing push, the Optimus humanoid robot program, and Starship’s development. TERAFAB is the capstone that ties them into a single coherent architecture — chips made on Earth, launched by SpaceX, powered by Tesla solar, run by xAI, and ultimately extended to the Moon.
“I want us to live long enough to see the mass driver on the moon, because that’s going to be incredibly epic,”Musk said during the presentation.
Announcing TERAFAB: the next step towards becoming a galactic civilization https://t.co/IDKey07mJa
— Tesla (@Tesla) March 22, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceX is quietly becoming the U.S. Military’s only reliable rocket
Space Force drops ULA for SpaceX on GPS launch after Vulcan rocket anomaly investigation halts flights.
The U.S. Space Force announced today it is switching an upcoming GPS III satellite launch from United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan rocket to a SpaceX Falcon 9, a move that is as much a reflection of Vulcan’s mounting problems as it is a validation of SpaceX’s growing dominance in national security space launch. The GPS III Space Vehicle 09, originally contracted to fly on Vulcan this month, will now target a late April liftoff on Falcon 9, marking the fourth consecutive GPS III satellite the Space Force has moved to SpaceX after contracts were originally awarded to ULA.
The immediate trigger is a solid rocket motor anomaly that occurred on February 12 during Vulcan’s USSF-87 mission. Although the payloads reached orbit and ULA declared the mission successful, the company characterized the malfunction as a “significant performance anomaly” and has since paused all military launches on Vulcan pending a root cause investigation.
“With this change, we are answering the call for rapid delivery of advanced GPS capability while the Vulcan anomaly investigation continues,” said Systems Delta 81 Commander Col. Ryan Hiserote. “We are once again demonstrating our team’s flexibility and are fully committed to leverage all options available for responsive and reliable launch for the Nation.”
The broader reality is that SpaceX’s reliability record and launch cadence have made it the path of least resistance for the Pentagon, and bodes well with Elon Musk’s plans to IPO SpaceX sometime this year. Its Falcon 9 is the most flight-proven rocket in history, and the Space Force’s Rapid Response Trailblazer program was specifically designed to enable exactly this kind of provider swap for GPS missions, and effectively building SpaceX’s flexibility into the national security launch architecture by design.
For ULA, the stakes are existential. The company entered 2026 with aspirations of finally turning a corner after years of Vulcan delays, with interim CEO John Elbon pointing to a backlog of over 80 missions as reason for optimism. Meanwhile, SpaceX’s contracts with the Space Force have given it a formal pathway to take on even more national security launches going forward.
The significance of today’s announcement extends beyond one satellite swap. It reinforces that America’s most critical space infrastructure, including GPS, missile warning, and beyond, is increasingly dependent on a single commercial provider.
Tesla officially begins sunset of Model S and Model X
Tesla shows off mysterious vehicle at Giga Texas
Tesla Cybertruck just won a rare and elusive crash safety honor
What is Digital Optimus? The new Tesla and xAI project explained
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
