Leading the team of companies planning to build a privately owned Starlab space station to replace the International Space Station in 2030, Voyager Technologies (VOYG 3.21%) arguably has the best chance of success and of beating out rival space companies Vast, Axiom Space, and Blue Origin as well. But this does leave one question open:
Once Voyager builds its space station in orbit... what does it plan to do up there?
Now we know: Voyager will manufacture fiber internet cable in space -- and the stock is up 8.8% as of 3 p.m. ET on the news.
Image source: Getty Images.
Fiber internet in space
Voyager just announced it has patented "an extraterrestrial manufacturing method that produces larger, purer crystals essential to high-performance optical communications – the backbone of Earth's data centers and the AI-driven global economy." (Yes, you read that right. Space company Voyager just said it's an artificial intelligence stock).
Optical fibers, explains Voyager, are "fabricated from crystal structures," and the ones Voyager plans to manufacture in microgravity will be "as perfect as materials science can make them." Once manufacturing begins, Voyager will produce "ultra-pure, wavelength-engineered crystals [that cause] no interference or unintended spectral artifacts ... [enabling] faster, cleaner and more resilient optical communications, whether in data centers on the ground or networks in orbit."
NYSE: VOYG
Key Data Points
What it means for Voyager stock
"Great idea!" you say. But when will Voyager start making money off of this? Well, management intends to send samples of the crystals it wants to produce to ISS in spring 2026, "to validate the method" described in its patent. Voyager first needs to ensure the method works, then determine how to scale manufacturing to create a viable business. Owning a space station should help with that.
Voyager plans to put Starlab in orbit no later than 2029.
