We're building [music] our own rocket

program to build data centers in space.

That's uh arguably the biggest economic

opportunity in the history of [music]

the space industry. That's been hard for

you to make that big. I mean, I think

the hard part is the fun part, right?

>> Sure.

>> If you want to do big stuff, a lot of

the time the path to the right idea is

just [music] getting started with the

idea that you think is the right.

>> What is the biggest pain point for

getting your operation [music] to where

you want it to be?

>> It's a very complicated business. One of

my sort of algorithms for this is asking

questions.

>> All right, welcome to a new episode of

Power Players. Uh, I'm psyched to bring

back this guest. We haven't talked in a

little bit, but he's got a lot going on.

Beijuot, Cowboy Space Corporation,

founder and CEO. Beiju, um, last time I

talked to you was called a different

company, man.

>> Yeah, it was.

>> It was Aether Flux, right?

>> Yeah, it was. It was.

>> What happened?

>> A lot of stuff has happened, man. A lot

of stuff has happened. Uh, yeah. So

should catch you up a little bit on

what's going on.

>> Yeah, absolutely.

>> So we had uh big announcement a couple

of months ago. Um three things. First

one, we renamed the company Cowboy Space

Corporation. The artist formerly known

as Aether Flux. Um and yeah, actually

really stoked about that name change.

It's like a I mean, as you know, I tend

to like the counterculture a little bit.

So there's a little bit of that. There's

a little bit of Americana. And also, I

mean, the second part of this is that

we're building our own rocket program to

build data centers in space. And so,

we're kind of forging our own path to

space, which is I think also very

cowboy. So, that's that's the second

thing. And the third thing is that we

raised $275 million for all this

development work. So, company is uh uh

giddy up and ready to go.

>> It's great. Hey, so compared to what you

were doing, Aether Flux, how is this

company different? Yeah, it's actually

an evolution of a lot of the core

technologies. So, I started left Robin

Hood a little over two years ago now to

work on space full-time

>> and the thesis in the beginning was and

kind of still is around energy in space

and what is the energy infrastructure of

space look like and building a native

energy company in space. The company

started out with the idea of space solar

power, which is an old idea from the

1970s and specifically around collecting

power in space and beaming it to places

where there's no existing power grid.

So, we're actually going to be doing

that later on this year. So, we have our

first satellite going to space that's

going to do space solar power, which

we're very excited about. Um, and that's

going to collect power in space and beam

it down to locations and, you know,

likely in places like White Sands, New

Mexico. um and we're going to be able to

convert that into electrical power. To

do that, we ended up building a pretty

significant amount of technology around

the optics and laser power management

side and the ability to be able to point

a laser from space down to Earth. The

second mission we have going to space is

actually going to use that technology

for data transmission. And this is kind

of the transition from you focusing

primarily on space-based solar power and

power beaming to the other application

for energy in space which is using it to

power data centers.

>> And so we've got a lot of work that

we're doing in that regard. Um and the

goal for that is to actually launch our

very first megawatt class data center

which is the entire upper stage of a

rocket and that's targeting at the end

of 2028. So a lot of stuff that goes

into that including building a whole

rocket. [laughter]

>> How do you build a whole rocket?

>> You start with the engines

>> that like these are major challenges

you're trying to overcome.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> Like what drives you to do this?

>> You know me at this point. I like to

build stuff.

>> You do.

>> Um I mean I've had a passion for space

since childhood.

>> Sure. And um the kind of realization

with this is is realizing if we want to

build a scale um data centers in space

which we think is you know arguably the

biggest economic opportunity in the

history of the space industry.

[snorts] The availability of launch

capacity and the ride to space um is a

major limiting factor. And while

companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin

are building huge rockets and making

good progress on that, we want to forge

our own path there. And we think that's

really critical both for controlling the

economics of what we build but also

integral to the design of what we're

building. And should I tell you a little

bit more about

>> Yeah, please. I'm I'm really this is the

year of space. I'm fascinated whatever

you're going to tell me.

>> Okay. Love it. Uh yeah, so data centers

in space. What what exactly

>> I don't even know what it means.

>> What does that even mean? Right. What

[snorts] that means is that these are

satellites, spacecraft that are in low

Earth orbit that are collecting power

from the sun, using it directly on the

spacecraft to do compute and then using

different methods of transmitting the

results back and forth from Earth or to

other places in space. Um, and when you

kind of look at that application of data

centers in space, couple things come up.

Number one is that um

when when you think about say two racks

of GPUs and if you had one rack of GPUs

here and one rack of GPUs in the

building across the street, strictly

worse than having them in the same

building. Um, and so if that's the case

and you apply this analogy to outer

space,

you actually want to think about a

monolithic architecture where if you

have a certain amount of mass orbit,

really concentrating that down to the

smallest number of individual spacecraft

so you get the most interconnectivity

between GPUs.

um number one and number two realizing

that

on the way to putting a satellite in

space, you end up lifting the upper

stage of the rocket

right there. Right? and realizing that

we can use the mass and volume of the

upper stage of the rocket as an integral

part of the data center because again

the point from a second ago is that you

want to think about the architecture of

this very differently than for example a

communications constellation where you

want to go with large monolithic

spacecraft.

Well, why not have the backbone of this

large monolithic spacecraft be the

rocket itself? And when you do that, you

free up um a lot of space in the actual

rocket itself for the compute and the

power generation and you can actually

use the shell of the rocket as a cooling

mechanism for the whole thing. So if you

go to our website and cowboyace.com, you

can see the the video that we made about

this. So actually the fairing of the

rocket, the shell of it when it gets to

orbit unfolds and becomes a big

radiator. H

>> which is pretty novel. Uh and we think

that this is one of the uh one of the

unique approaches to building data

centers in space that actually unlocks

what we think are going to be very

lowcost economics for doing this.

>> How we we are watching the AI boom here

on planet earth. How important is it

>> to build data centers in space to

support what we are doing here on mother

earth?

>> I think it's I mean I personally think

it's critical. Um, and I think we're

already starting to see the effects of

using so much of our terrestrial energy

grid for data centers, right? And you

see this movement of not my backyard,

etc., etc.

>> Nimbies, not in my backyard. That one of

the property brothers gave me that one.

I didn't know what they meant. I got

after Nimbies.

>> Yeah. Yeah, I guess so.

>> Um,

>> yeah. And I think as we look

specifically around the United States,

our energy infrastructure on this

planet, I'd like to see it used for

people and let's build a big power grid

in space and use that for AI. Um, and I

think the the appeal of this is also

that once this gets up and running, the

prospect of bringing new chipsets online

actually transitions from,

hey, let's go get a land lease and work

with the local power plant and work with

local communities and do all this stuff,

which has a pretty long delay time,

saying, "Let's take those chipsets and

integrate them into a spacecraft and get

it to the launchpad." And we think that

we can do that. um in a matter of weeks

whereas the process right now is you

know it's pushing 5 to seven years in a

lot of cases.

>> Terrible. So do you work

do you work with a SpaceX? Are you

trying to build another SpaceX? How are

you guys different?

>> So yeah so we do work with SpaceX on the

launch of our first two satellites to

space. So we're using a ride share

program to do it. But longterm we're

actually going to build our own launch

vehicle. So, we're going to have our own

rockets, our own launchpad, and our own

rocket,

>> just like we see over at SpaceX with

Elon, those the rockets that go up and

they come back and they land in the

middle of the water.

>> Um, yeah, we're going to try to catch

catch them and land them back on launch

pads.

[laughter]

>> I I said this to you last time I talked

to you, like

>> I just think of back to everything you

and Vlad built in Robin Hood. Now, to

sit here and talk about rockets with you

is um just a lot for me to take in. I

got to be honest with you.

>> Is that Yeah,

>> it is. Like, it's just has it been hard

for you to make that pivot? Uh, I mean I

think the hard part is the fun part,

right? Sure.

>> Like it's the whole point of this is to

challenge myself and do something

different. I mean there's an alternative

reality where after Robin Hood I'm

building like an enterprise SAS company.

>> Nobody wants to do that fest.

>> Yeah. You wouldn't get be able to get me

out of bed for that one. Um, yeah. No, I

mean I I'd had a love of doing this my

whole life. And I remember um way before

I had even a breadcrumb of success. I'm

like if you ever hit a big at the space

thing,

>> start ever had big at this finance

thing, start a space company.

>> What was that conversation with with

Vlad um saying, "Hey, hey dude, I'm

going to go do the space thing."

>> I mean, I think he's he's heard me talk

about it a lot over the years.

>> Sure. I remember um

and this is like going back like over 10

years when we lived in New York. Um we

would, you know, be doing market stuff

all day and then stay up coding all

night

>> or little, you know, sweaty little

two-bedroom apartment which was also

where like a bunch of our friends lived.

Uh, and in the wee hours of the night

being like, you know, it' be really cool

if we could mine helium 3 on the moon,

it was like kind of that moment in the

evening where you're just like, you need

to go to bed,

>> but instead you're just like thinking

about science and weird stuff. It's

like, yeah, what if we did?

>> Does he want did he want to go into

space or like or he's just he's cool at

Robin Hood.

>> Uh, I mean Vlad's Vlad's got a lot of

stuff going on. Um, I'm not sure if he

wants to go to space. Uh, but he's

working on math stuff.

>> Yeah.

>> So, yeah, he's he's got a lot of ideas.

So

>> no shortage of ideas on that one

>> at

>> at this point like what

what is the biggest pain point for

getting your operation to where you want

it to be? Is it government? It is design

is it design? Can't get enough chips? Is

it all three of them and probably 40

more I'm not even thinking of. I mean, I

think it's it's a very complicated

business and it's getting

it's getting all the different pieces

moving in unison because we're trying to

build

we're trying to build and launch a

rocket

by the end of 2028 and we didn't start

all that long ago. I mean, this will be,

you know, very very fast development by

any standard of doing this. And

one of my sort of algorithms for this is

asking the question, what is what is the

thing I could do today that derisks that

timeline the most? And what are the

things that if I don't do in short order

are going to, you know, really challenge

that timeline and working backwards from

there. And so

as different as it is from building a

consumer finance product, still building

a company.

>> Sure. So, you still have to hire people,

get people working really hard, get

people motivated about the mission of

the company, um,

and,

you know, make sure that I'm kind of

running ahead of what the roadblocks are

and trying to unblock them.

>> Is it hard to find talent to do what

you're trying to do?

>> Um, we've actually had uh, well, first

things, where's the camera? We are

recruiting. We're hiring. So, if you're

if you're looking if you're looking to

work in the space industry, you know

about this stuff. Um, the company's got

a great name, too.

>> Yeah. Um, and the swag is good.

>> The swag's good.

>> Swag is good.

>> Uh, is it hard hiring people? It's

gotten a lot uh, it's gotten a lot

easier since we announced what we're

working on, and I think there's a lot of

excitement around it. I mean, it's

always hard hiring people. Um, but the

chance to build a new rocket program

from the ground up, um, I think we've

got some really awesome people on the

team. Is it you I was talking to um

another episode I did for this podcast

with Mike Row and we were talking a lot

about the skilled labor shortage. Is it

hard to find people that just want to

pick up a hammer and help build a

rocket?

Good question. We're not quite at that

part of the labor force yet. So on the

on the rocket side, we're focused pretty

much on vehicle design, engine design,

and we're going to end up bringing on

board a lot more folks that actually

build the stuff

>> in the next sort of the there's a lot of

chapters of this company that we're

flipping the pages through pretty

quickly, but I think that's one chapter

away.

But I think that, you know, Yeah, it's

it's it's definitely something I'm

thinking about already.

>> Yes. Yeah. What is your ideal engine

look like?

>> Good question. Um, as simple as

possible, but no simpler.

>> Sure.

>> Uh, I think that there and we'll have a

lot more of that. We're going to we're

going to actually unveil a lot more of

the technical details of the engine

architecture, the rocket, the size of

it, how pointy it is,

>> all the important details people care

about.

>> Like all this stuff has to be perfect. I

mean, you're flying something to the

sky.

>> Yeah. It's got to work really well for

like two minutes.

>> Mhm.

>> To get it to space.

>> Like we've seen these rockets that

Elon's launch and then they return to

the middle of the water somewhere.

>> Like that's really hard.

>> Yeah.

>> Right. As someone doing this,

how can you even how do you even achieve

something like that?

>> Yeah. Um well, first you just got to put

one foot in front of the other, you

know? I think the the first part is

picking, you know, building the team to

build the rocket engines. We've got

really awesome team in Seattle that's

coming together to do this. A lot of

experience on that team um working on

rocket programs and kind of, you know,

you get the people that know the

different subcomponents and you and you

get that talent density I think in the

beginning that you get the design of it

pretty close to what you want to build.

And so think about things from people

building turbo machinery to people that

build valves and injectors

to people that know about how to design

the nozzle of the rocket engine. the

overall, you know, fluid dynamics and

the fluid modeling and all of these

very, very specialized subd disciplines

that you have to kind of bring together

to get to an engine design

that has the right performance

characteristics to be able to launch the

vehicle that we're trying to build to

space. So, that's kind of the the step

that we're at and we're kind of

designing that and going through the

details of each one of the

subasssemblies.

Um,

and we want to get to the engine program

getting pretty far ahead of things. The

next step after that is actually making

the giant rocket out of it. So, you make

the engines. This is the simple version.

You make the big tube that is a vehicle.

>> You make the engines to the vehicle. And

then the last part of this is the actual

launchpad and launch facility. Building

that. building the launch tower,

building all the infrastructure to be

able to

>> where are you going to refurbish the

stuff? Uh, so TBD on the the launchpad

and the vehicle production facility.

Still working through those details, but

the engines are going to be built in

Seattle.

>> Very cool. Why Seattle? There's just

>> a lot of people I guess is the Boeing

time. Aren't they still in Seattle, I

think?

>> Yeah, there are. There's there's a lot

of rocket engine people in Seattle.

>> Interesting.

>> Yeah, there's a there's a lot of space

stuff in Seattle. Um, and you kind of

got to go where the talent is, you know.

>> Were when you were out there raising

this latest um, round of money, what did

you hear from investors?

>> Um,

>> do they give you leeway because you

co-founded a successful company, Robin

Hood, or they're like, "Yeah, okay. I

mean, look, here's what need to know.

Like, when are we making our money

back?"

>> A little bit of column A, a little bit

of column B. Um, yeah. I think I think

that the overcoming it's like oh you

know Robin Hood to rockets like what

what's going on here and I think when

people realize that it's been such a

passion of mine for such a long time and

that this is fundamentally around

building a business that sells compute

as a service and that the overall

architecture

is fundamentally about the economics of

it. Right? That's the whole thing is how

do you get to cost parody with the

service on the ground which in many ways

I think um

is is not all that different from the

thinking of Robin Hood right it's like

how do you build these financial

services

um and get them out to millions of

people and operate the cost structure

that we do etc etc given the complexity

of what you are trying to build

literally from the ground floor do you

get more leeway from investors uh in

that, hey, look guys, this is going to

take a long time to build. Just get off

my ass a little bit. I mean, I don't I

don't mind people being kind of on my

ass about this stuff because it's good

motivation.

>> Um, yeah, I I don't I don't know if

there's there's leeway or not leeway. I

think people that invest in the company

want to see it happen and I think we're

pushing a pretty aggressive timeline on

it. Um, but we got a lot of work to do

to actually deliver it. So,

>> so in a perfect case, do I would I

subscribe to your service? How how does

it make money at some point?

>> Yeah, the way it makes money is actually

the sale of GPU hours, right? So, the

access to compute and there's different

forms that this can take on, right? You

can have have a version of this where we

partner with a major AI lab um and are

providing compute to them. There's also

versions of this that we uh directly

sell tokens. I think there's going to be

a lot of development open source models.

I think we're we're still a little bit

away from kind of finalizing those

details and kind of building the company

brick by brick as it goes by.

>> What did the uh what did the SpaceX IPO

mean for you?

Yeah, I mean I think um

it's it's pretty profound in the context

of the space industry because it really

puts into focus the commercial potential

of the space industry as a whole

and and for me it kind of is uh it makes

me reflect back in some ways to my

childhood and growing up around NASA

Langley and and and viewing this very

much as a the space industry is a

byproduct of the government, right? This

exists for government use cases,

government applications.

Um, and while that's important,

anything that's purely done for and by

the government is not going to have the

pace of innovation that capitalism

brings. and to see

sort of after the SpaceX IPO a new

generation of institutional investors,

retail investors

um and just the collective consciousness

in the world that there is commercial

opportunity at scale in the space

industry I think is hugely powerful.

What role do you think government will

play in this next generation of space? I

mean I think

a very very integral role like

undeniably both from the regulatory side

I think also supporting the development

of space companies along the way.

There's a lot of the core infrastructure

in the US that is uh still very much run

and controlled by the government. I

think the big one there is launchpad

availability and launch infrastructure.

And I think there's one other point to

kind of get across here is we need more

launch pads in the US both for companies

like ours and the Blue Origins, the

SpaceX's and the other companies that

want to put more and more mass to orbit.

Um,

>> and the government just doesn't want to

build more launch pads for y'all. No, I

think the government does want to build

more launch pads, but I think we're at

at an inflection point where

>> the transition that I think we're going

to see is viewing launch infrastructure

and launch pads and spaceports around

the US much more like airports than we

look at them today, right? where there's

airports all around the US and it's

because the cadence of flights is I mean

you go on like you know the flight

tracking apps and stuff like that you're

like holy cow right isn't it mission

critical I guess to your point what

you're kind of getting at it's mission

critical to get these things in the

ground given the use cases for it I mean

AI is exploding

>> I mean we need more power build more

launch pads

>> that's another way of solving the

problem Yeah. Yeah. Building more launch

pads.

Um before I let you go, what it's still

amazing me to hear you like building

this like it's wild. U what did you

learn from Robin Hood that you have now

pour back into this business and has

allowed you to start building rockets

from scratch? I mean the journey I mean

having built that company that the the

knowledge as an entrepreneur is like

I I look back on it and I realize that I

was like I was an entrepreneur since I

was like in my early mid20s.

>> Mhm.

>> Like since I was a kid like a lot of

this stuff is now muscle memory for me.

You know, I think the experience and

knowledge of going from idea to IPO

to public company um in a very tightly

regulated business doing it in a world

with very wellestablished incumbents

um yeah it's

a a privilege to be able to apply that

to something else.

>> What do you think has made you

successful as an entrepreneur?

>> What is it about you? Uh,

you know, I think there's a there's a

grit and tenacity that comes from being

little immigrant kid that grew up, you

know, without all that much. That was

that was going for me, you know, like

you just I I I think about that now as

parent and realizing that my kids are

going to have a very different

experience than the one that I did. But

look, childhood was was one that was

filled in a very loving home, but I

would say challenging economic

circumstances and uh yeah, there's that

there's that dog any of that that I've

got. If is that the best advice to that

you can give to an aspiring

entrepreneur? I you have to I'm sure you

mentor some folks some people out there

look that look to your advice

>> for advice. What do you what do you tell

them that you know they see the career

that you have had how can they do what

you have done?

>> Yeah, I think don't wait too long if you

want to be an entrepreneur. I think

there's a this is actually one of the

things that I'm reliving the journey of

an entrepreneur now and I think about

which is like

the the role of the idea versus the role

of the execution.

Um I think even in the context of this

right I think had I not started with

this idea of space solar power I'm not

sure that I would have arrived at the

idea

>> you were very early on I remember we

originally talked I would be honest you

I'm like I don't know what this is but

it sounds cool and I can make a use case

for it but you were ahead of everyone we

had that and Rocket Lab started to pick

up its business even more we had the

SpaceX IPO and now you're back here with

like further fine-tuning this business.

>> Yeah. Um, I think if I had not

just kind of said this is the direction,

right, wouldn't have arrived at the idea

that I ended up doing with Cowboy Space

Corporation. And I think this is kind of

like a lesson that has repeated itself

from the Robin Hood days where there

were companies before Robin Hood

>> um that were not successful. But it's

like if you want to do big stuff, these

none of these things are overnight

successes, right? And a lot of the time

the path to the right idea is just

getting started with with the idea that

you think is the right one. So kind of

the don't wait for the perfect idea.

You'll probably find it along the way.

And the thing that actually matters is

the pace of execution.

Um and the tenacity. The idea is

important, but I think a lot of people

get very fixated on like the idea is the

only thing that matters.

Has this lastly is this has it sunk into

you that if you nail this right, you

land this right,

the impact he will have driven to the

world.

>> Oh my god, it's very motivating. It's

very motivating. I mean, I think for a

person like me getting a chance to play

for a big prize a second time

like that, arguably a bigger prize than

Robin Hood. I love I love Robin Hood. I

what you guys built there tremendous.

But this is a totally different

>> Yeah. It's a totally different ball

game.

>> Very very I mean that's that's the goal,

right? I mean that's the

like that's the reason why I've got that

sort of like got to do it all like as

quickly as possible. Work super hard.

Get all the details right. Uh you're

just going to have to like be a little

bit like what is it? Brian Johnson live

forever, dude. Because you're gonna have

to see this through.

>> Yeah, he's looking good these days.

>> I saw a saw at an event like a month

ago. He is looking pretty good.

>> Yeah. I'm like everything I've been

reading that's Wow, that's Brian

Johnson.

>> I want I want to meet the guy. I haven't

met him yet. Yeah,

>> you guys got to hang out. Uh good to see

you.

>> Likewise.

>> Good to see you. Let's uh let's not wait

too long before I end the chat. I

appreciate it. All right, that's it for

the latest episode of Power Players.

Appreciate it.