Besxar, a startup founded by former OpenAI employee Ashley Pilipiszyn, is developing orbital semiconductor manufacturing. The company aims to utilize space vacuum conditions to produce high-purity materials for advanced chips, replacing terrestrial cleanroom infrastructure.
The startup has secured nearly $14 million in funding to support its operations. In July, Besxar launched its first two 'fabships'—specialized containers for material testing—aboard a SpaceX Starlink mission to validate the technology.
Despite a minor data logging error in one unit, the orbital samples showed significantly lower particle contamination than earthbound counterparts. Besxar plans to refine its processes over the next two years, eventually moving to larger installations on the SpaceX Starship rocket.
The company intends to supply semiconductor wafers for data centers, robotics, and electric vehicles. Future scaling depends on the availability of cost-effective launch vehicles, such as Starship or upcoming models from Rocket Lab and Stoke Space, to enable the return of large volumes of finished products to Earth.
