Besxar Partners With SpaceX to Build Orbital Semiconductor Fabs

San Francisco-based technology startup Besxar has secured an agreement with SpaceX to test orbital semiconductor manufacturing hardware across a 12-flight contract utilizing Falcon 9 rocket boosters. Founded by former OpenAI staffer Ashley Pilipiszyn, Besxar aims to produce critical precursors for advanced microchips by utilizing the natural vacuum of low-Earth orbit, bypassing the multi-billion-dollar clean room infrastructure required for terrestrial semiconductor fabrication.

The move coincides with unprecedented capital expansion across the commercial space transport layer. Rocket developer Stoke Space completed the initial closing of a $1 billion Series E funding round to scale production of fully reusable orbital rockets. Together, these developments highlight an accelerating shift among hardware companies toward leveraging space as an industrial environment for advanced technology manufacturing.

To validate its hardware without waiting for dedicated space stations or custom reentry capsules, Besxar reached a novel commercial arrangement with SpaceX. The startup is mounting small fabrication canisters, designated as fabships, directly to SpaceX Falcon 9 first-stage boosters. Because Falcon 9 boosters routinely return to Earth after launching satellite payloads, they offer a predictable, high-frequency vehicle for orbital testing and material retrieval.

To finance the multi-year development roadmap, Pilipiszyn has raised nearly $14 million in equity funding. The capital includes a $9.35 million seed round led by Dauntless Ventures and co-led by Overture VC, with participation from 645 Ventures, Singh Capital Partners, Koru Capital, and Plum Alley Ventures. Pilipiszyn originally approached SpaceX three years ago to explore payload space on the heavy-lift Starship vehicle, eventually selecting booster-integrated canisters as a faster mechanism to de-risk the technology.

"We're at a time where it's actually more cost-effective to go where the physics already works," Pilipiszyn stated regarding the company's operational thesis. "Don't do it on Earth where you're fighting physics."

Terrestrial chip fabrication plants require immense expenditure to maintain pressurized clean rooms, where high-powered vacuum pumps and air filtration systems keep microscopic dust particles from damaging silicon wafers. In orbit, the vacuum environment exists naturally above the Kármán line. Besxar's technical objective is to expose semiconductor substrates to orbital vacuum while protecting them from external contaminants, such as atomic oxygen present in low-Earth orbit.

Besxar completed its initial suborbital flight test on July 5, flying two canister modules aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch that carried Starlink satellites. The mission carried test wafers from Besxar alongside material samples for academic researchers at the University of Virginia and the University of Texas at Austin. Despite an isolated malfunction in the flight data system of one canister, both containers successfully survived launch vibration, exposed the wafers to space vacuum, and protected the substrates during atmospheric reentry.

Initial analysis confirmed that the returned materials maintained superior purity compared to terrestrial reference samples. "The flown samples were the cleanest and had the least amount of particulate matter compared to... nonflown terrestrial wafers, which is fantastic for us as we scale up," Pilipiszyn said. "If we can't keep it clean and protect the wafers, nothing else matters."

Over the next two years, Besxar plans to execute its remaining 11 contracted flights with SpaceX, incrementally advancing its orbital manufacturing processes. Upcoming test objectives include heating the semiconductor wafers in orbit, followed by single-layer and multi-layer chemical material deposition. Once process qualification is established, the company intends to supply high-purity silicon wafers to microchip manufacturers producing power-regulation semiconductors for artificial intelligence data centers, robotics, and electric vehicles.

Scaling up to industrial production will require transitioning from small booster canisters to larger manufacturing modules capable of processing thousands of wafers per flight. Besxar plans to deploy these larger fabships on heavy-capacity launch systems such as SpaceX's Starship or rival vehicles under development by companies like Rocket Lab and Stoke Space. Peer enterprises, including United Semiconductors and Space Forge, are targeting similar space-based manufacturing applications, though all remain reliant on affordable, high-volume orbital transport and recovery.

"We believe that there is a solid transport layer now, so we can focus on the application layer," Pilipiszyn noted. "We can just focus on our core manufacturing and getting our products back down to earth to market as quickly as possible."

The feasibility of commercial orbital manufacturing depends directly on the cost and frequency of rocket launches. Addressing that bottleneck, launch provider Stoke Space Technologies closed the initial phase of a $1 billion Series E equity round, bringing its total raised capital to $2.3 billion. The round was led by Point72 Ventures and Spark Capital, with participation from General Innovation, Glade Brook Capital, US Innovative Technology, Washington Harbour Partners, Woven Capital, and Y Combinator.

Unlike conventional launch systems that reuse only the first-stage booster, Stoke Space is engineering a fully reusable rocket where both the booster and the payload-carrying upper stage return intact to Earth. To solve upper-stage reentry heating without heavy thermal tiles, Stoke utilizes an active cooling system that flows super-cooled liquid hydrogen through the vehicle's heat shield.

"This round is really to scale," said Stoke Space Chief Executive Officer Andy Lapsa. "To lay the infrastructure, to scale in production and flight frequency, and importantly to fund the development of the second generation vehicle."

Stoke Space expects its initial rocket, the Nova Pathfinder, to perform its debut orbital flight in early 2027 following structural and operational testing at its Moses Lake facility in Washington. Designed to carry three metric tons to low-Earth orbit, Nova Pathfinder has already secured commercial launch contracts. Concurrently, Stoke is developing the Nova Block 2, a larger vehicle designed to transport 15 metric tons to orbit, matching the payload capacity of SpaceX's Falcon 9.

The target deployment of Nova Block 2 in 2029 coincides with potential timelines for Falcon 9's phase-out as SpaceX shifts focus toward Starship. Because internal Starlink deployments may limit third-party customer capacity on Starship, independent launch providers like Stoke Space aim to serve commercial satellite and manufacturing operators requiring dedicated orbital transport.

"It amplifies the mismatch between launch supply and demand for launch, there's no question about that," Lapsa stated regarding market availability. "Regardless of Falcon 9 retiring or not retiring, the space industry and the space economy scales exactly as fast as rockets get off the ground, particularly rockets that serve third-party customers."

Besxar expects to execute its second suborbital test mission with SpaceX before the end of 2026, advancing to thermal testing on wafer samples. Meanwhile, Stoke Space is preparing for combined ground test firings of the Nova Pathfinder rocket and launch pad systems, establishing the groundwork for flight qualification ahead of its target 2027 debut.