SpaceX eyes acquisition of optical startup Mesh Optical Technologies

Elon Musk is eyeing an acquisition of Mesh Optical Technologies, a startup founded by former SpaceX engineers. The potential transaction was revealed in a Federal Trade Commission filing and first reported by Bloomberg. The Federal Trade Commission, which serves as the US antitrust regulator, confirmed in its filing that it has expedited its antitrust review of the acquisition. This decision to expedite the review process represents a key regulatory step for the proposed transaction. The target company, Mesh Optical Technologies, specializes in developing optical transceivers, which are specialized hardware components used for fast data center communications. This acquisition would bring the startup’s technology under the control of Elon Musk and SpaceX, the aerospace company.

Mesh Optical Technologies came out of stealth in February, at which point it announced that it had raised a $50 million Series A funding round. This early-stage venture capital funding round was led by Thrive Capital. The startup was established by three co-founders: Travis Brashears, Cameron Ramos, and Serena Grown-Haeberli. All three are former SpaceX engineers who previously worked on the optical communication links that keep thousands of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites interconnected. Following their work on satellite systems, the co-founders saw a commercial opportunity to develop optical transceivers for terrestrial data centers. Their focus on light-based hardware stems from the technology being faster and more energy-efficient than traditional electrical-based systems, which rely on electrical signals rather than light.

The acquisition could eventually allow SpaceX to improve the efficiency of its data centers. SpaceX, which operates as an aerospace company and data center operator, has recently entered into agreements with several technology firms, including Anthropic, Google, and Reflection AI, to provide them with compute capacity, which is the processing power provided by data centers. These agreements have generated a new revenue stream for SpaceX. By acquiring Mesh Optical Technologies, SpaceX could integrate specialized optical hardware to boost the performance of its infrastructure. These efficiency gains could eventually benefit SpaceX’s data centers whether they are located on Earth or, in the future, in space.

Why it matters

This acquisition highlights SpaceX’s push to optimize its data center infrastructure. By integrating specialized optical hardware, the company could boost efficiency for compute operations, whether they are based on Earth or eventually in space.