The desire to manufacture semiconductors in space has just taken a serious step forward

The desire to manufacture semiconductors in space has just taken a serious step forward

By Jackie Flynn Mogensen edited by Claire Cameron

Space Forge’s mission is to manufacture semiconductors in space, without the need for humans. And on Wednesday, the U.K.-based aerospace startup announced it had taken a major step toward that goal by creating plasma, or superheated gas, for the first time aboard a commercial satellite.

Semiconductor manufacturing requires extremely precise conditions, and NASA and industry groups have argued that the microgravity environment of space is better for their manufacturing than that of Earth. The reasons are varied, but part of it has to do with the way silicon behaves in such an environment: it’s simply easier to get the material to adhere to the structure needed to make a semiconductor.

Indeed, Space Forge’s feat builds on previous work done on the International Space Station, says Clayton Swope, deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank.

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“The main difference here is that this was done without a crew, without people, on a completely commercial spacecraft,” he says. “This demonstration shows that the manufacturing of semiconductor crystals can take place in space simply using machines.”

“Keeping people alive in space is expensive,” adds Swope. “If machines can do this work instead, it will reduce the cost of manufacturing in space.”

Joshua Western, CEO of Space Forge, said in a press release that the company’s work proves that the ideal environment for semiconductor manufacturing “can be created on a dedicated commercial satellite, opening the door to an entirely new manufacturing frontier.” Space Forge launched its ForgeStar-1 satellite in June. Its microwave-sized factory includes an oven that the company says reaches temperatures of about 1,832 degrees Fahrenheit (1,000 degrees Celsius).

Other companies and research teams are jumping into the burgeoning space manufacturing industry. In 2024, another startup, Varda Space Industries, demonstrated that it was possible to grow crystals of the antiviral drug ritonavir on an uncrewed commercial spacecraft and return them to Earth. And researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich recently 3D printed human tissue in microgravity.

Manufacturing in space is in its “early stages,” Libby Jackson, head of space at the Science Museum in England, told the BBC. But testing and proving technology like Space Forge’s “really opens the door to an economically viable product, where things can be manufactured in space and come back to Earth and be used and beneficial to everyone on Earth.”

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