Muon Space Announces Starship-Class Spacecraft Platform Built for Scale

Muon Space Announces Starship-Class Spacecraft Platform Built for Scale

Muon Space, the Mission Foundry for high-performance satellite constellations, unveiled Condor-Ultra, its newest spacecraft platform developed for high-power, networked constellations of hundreds to thousands of satellites. Optimized for stackable mass-deployment from SpaceX’s Starship, Condor-Ultra anchors communications, sensing and data-center class compute missions with the most demanding power, aperture and data requirements at unprecedented scale and unit economics. Configurations for today’s medium-lift launch vehicles, including Falcon 9 and Rocket Lab’s Neutron, are also available.

The announcement marks another milestone in Muon’s rapid product cadence: less than a year after unveiling its XL platform, the company is bringing the Ultra platform to market. Condor-Ultra features 20kW power, >18m2 nadir payload area, Starlink 25Gbps network connectivity, Muon’s groundbreaking Starlight propulsion, and the demonstrated reliability, availability and performance Muon’s Mission Foundry is known for. The first Condor-Ultra pathfinder is slated for delivery in 2028. 

“The most compelling space infrastructure missions of the next decade from global communications networks to scaled remote sensing to distributed orbital compute require a managed and integrated platform that is powerful, stackable, and built to scale cost effectively. Condor-Ultra delivers exactly that, and it does it on the strong foundation of a flight-proven satellite, operations, data, and software stack our customers already trust,” said Jonny Dyer, CEO of Muon Space.

Condor-Ultra's power, thermal, and networking architecture is designed from the ground up to meet the unique demands of orbital data centers scalable power generation, high-density compute workloads, and reliable autonomous mission, network, and data operations at constellation scale. With higher-powered variants up to 100 kW, Condor-Ultra is the foundation for large-scale orbital compute and networking. The platform is architected to integrate next-generation AI inference hardware, including the NVIDIA Space-1 Vera Rubin Module purpose-built for AI inferencing in space, with the Rubin GPU delivering up to 25 times the AI compute performance of the H100 for orbital workloads.

Through feasibility work with hyperscalers on large-scale AI infrastructure in orbit, Muon has developed deep expertise in the technical and operational requirements of next-generation orbital data centers expertise that directly informs Condor-Ultra's architecture and design priorities. Consistent with its mission-optimization strategy, Muon is extending its vertical integration with Condor-Ultra by internalizing all critical subsystems and components. This continues the approach Muon pioneered with avionics, propulsion, communications, GNC, flight software and networking: by controlling more of the spacecraft stack, Muon optimizes at the system level for mission performance, strengthens quality control and deterministic delivery, and reduces recurring costs. For operators with aggressive deployment economics, this level of integration is not a differentiator, it is a requirement.

Key Platform Capabilities 

  • Stackable launch configuration for SpaceX’s Starship – Minimizes launch costs and enables economical constellation deployment at a scale of hundreds to thousands of satellites. 
  • Scalable power architecture – 20kW initial power with 100 kW future variants; architecture is modular designed to scale by mission need.
  • NVIDIA Space-1 Vera Rubin Module integration – Orbital data center configurations will support NVIDIA's space-qualified AI inference platform, with the Rubin GPU enabling up to 25x the compute performance of H100 GPUs for large-scale AI workloads in orbit. 
  • >18 m² nadir payload area – Over 18 square meters of Earth-facing surface area available for sensors and instruments, enabling large and highly capable payload configurations. 
  • Full-stack, managed autonomy – Muon’s deeply integrated flight, network and ground stack and autonomous operations present a turnkey operational solution to customers. 
  • Broad mission support – Communications, connectivity, sensing and emerging orbital compute nodes. 
  • 100 Gbps intersatellite optical mesh networking – High-bandwidth crosslinks enable mesh constellation architectures for communications and distributed compute. 
  • Always-on 25Gbps connectivity via Starlink – Persistent internet connectivity ensures continuous mission operations and real-time data delivery.

Click here to learn more about Muon Space's Constellation Stack

Publisher: SatNow
Tags:-  SatelliteLaunchGroundSensors

GNSS Constellations - A list of all GNSS satellites by constellations

beidou

Satellite NameOrbit Date
BeiDou-3 G4Geostationary Orbit (GEO)17 May, 2023
BeiDou-3 G2Geostationary Orbit (GEO)09 Mar, 2020
Compass-IGSO7Inclined Geosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)09 Feb, 2020
BeiDou-3 M19Medium Earth Orbit (MEO)16 Dec, 2019
BeiDou-3 M20Medium Earth Orbit (MEO)16 Dec, 2019
BeiDou-3 M21Medium Earth Orbit (MEO)23 Nov, 2019
BeiDou-3 M22Medium Earth Orbit (MEO)23 Nov, 2019
BeiDou-3 I3Inclined Geosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)04 Nov, 2019
BeiDou-3 M23Medium Earth Orbit (MEO)22 Sep, 2019
BeiDou-3 M24Medium Earth Orbit (MEO)22 Sep, 2019

galileo

Satellite NameOrbit Date
GSAT0223MEO - Near-Circular05 Dec, 2021
GSAT0224MEO - Near-Circular05 Dec, 2021
GSAT0219MEO - Near-Circular25 Jul, 2018
GSAT0220MEO - Near-Circular25 Jul, 2018
GSAT0221MEO - Near-Circular25 Jul, 2018
GSAT0222MEO - Near-Circular25 Jul, 2018
GSAT0215MEO - Near-Circular12 Dec, 2017
GSAT0216MEO - Near-Circular12 Dec, 2017
GSAT0217MEO - Near-Circular12 Dec, 2017
GSAT0218MEO - Near-Circular12 Dec, 2017

glonass

Satellite NameOrbit Date
Kosmos 2569--07 Aug, 2023
Kosmos 2564--28 Nov, 2022
Kosmos 2559--10 Oct, 2022
Kosmos 2557--07 Jul, 2022
Kosmos 2547--25 Oct, 2020
Kosmos 2545--16 Mar, 2020
Kosmos 2544--11 Dec, 2019
Kosmos 2534--27 May, 2019
Kosmos 2529--03 Nov, 2018
Kosmos 2527--16 Jun, 2018

gps

Satellite NameOrbit Date
Navstar 82Medium Earth Orbit19 Jan, 2023
Navstar 81Medium Earth Orbit17 Jun, 2021
Navstar 78Medium Earth Orbit22 Aug, 2019
Navstar 77Medium Earth Orbit23 Dec, 2018
Navstar 76Medium Earth Orbit05 Feb, 2016
Navstar 75Medium Earth Orbit31 Oct, 2015
Navstar 74Medium Earth Orbit15 Jul, 2015
Navstar 73Medium Earth Orbit25 Mar, 2015
Navstar 72Medium Earth Orbit29 Oct, 2014
Navstar 71Medium Earth Orbit02 Aug, 2014

irnss

Satellite NameOrbit Date
NVS-01Geostationary Orbit (GEO)29 May, 2023
IRNSS-1IInclined Geosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)12 Apr, 2018
IRNSS-1HSub Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (Sub-GTO)31 Aug, 2017
IRNSS-1GGeostationary Orbit (GEO)28 Apr, 2016
IRNSS-1FGeostationary Orbit (GEO)10 Mar, 2016
IRNSS-1EGeosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)20 Jan, 2016
IRNSS-1DInclined Geosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)28 Mar, 2015
IRNSS-1CGeostationary Orbit (GEO)16 Oct, 2014
IRNSS-1BInclined Geosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)04 Apr, 2014
IRNSS-1AInclined Geosynchronous Orbit (IGSO)01 Jul, 2013
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