Axiom Space plans to start producing materials for chips in space

A dizzying idea with a rational grain is to establish the production of high-purity materials for the production of chips on Earth directly in space. With this in mind, representatives of the American company Axiom Space visited Taiwan to discuss prospects. However, the question arises: does this make economic sense? There are serious doubts about this.

Image Source: Intel

It looks like Axiom Space will be the first private business to build its own orbital station. However, it is worth remembering that it is the integrator of the project, and the hardware itself will be produced by contractors such as the Italian company Thales Alenia Space and others. However, as the initiator of the idea, Axiom Space intends to go further, offering new business lines in space, which, as it became known from Taiwanese sources, includes the field of manufacturing in microgravity conditions.

As Focus Taiwan reported, representatives from Axiom Space recently visited Taiwan to pitch the idea of ​​manufacturing certain semiconductor materials in space. Microgravity and vacuum conditions in low orbit create opportunities for growing crystal structures with fewer defects, higher purity and uniform doping with additives. The company intends to start with small production volumes, gradually increasing the scale.

Taking into account the current costs of delivering a payload into space, the cost of sending one kilogram of cargo into orbit is $3,000 or more. The advent of SpaceX’s Starship could lower that bar to $2,000 per kilogram or even less. However, taking into account the weight of one silicon wafer (100–150 grams) and its cost of production on Earth ($100 to $200), production in space does not yet seem economically feasible and will remain so for a long time.

It is possible that by the end of the next decade there may be a need for ultra-clean substrates for the production of semiconductors with transistors of atomic size and smaller. In this case, the production of raw materials for chips, namely growing crystalline substrates in space, may turn out to be profitable. However, whether this assumption will be confirmed, only time and… planned tests on board the ISS will tell, if it comes to their implementation.