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The Data Center Rundown

Feb 10, 2026

Emerging topics we picked up on in the 115 Data Center articles we scanned this week:

  • Operators secure permits for natural gas and nuclear self-generation
  • SpaceX files for million-satellite orbital data center constellation
  • DRAM prices projected to double as AI demand hits supply limits

Read the full Week in Review →

 
Feasibility of orbital data centers

The proposed deployment of space-based data centers by SpaceX, relying on a vast constellation of up to one million satellites, is considered technically conceivable by some analysts but faces immense technical, operational, and financial hurdles.

Read at Data Center Knowledge→

China has announced intentions to construct data centers in space within the coming years as part of its broader space initiative, indicating a significant future development for digital infrastructure beyond Earth.

Read at TechRepublic→

The Federal Communications Commission is soliciting public comments for a period of one month regarding SpaceX's proposal for a million orbital data centers.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

 

Do you plan to submit feedback to the FCC regarding SpaceX's orbital data center proposal?

 
Financing massive AI infrastructure projects

Amazon's substantial capital expenditure for artificial intelligence is encountering power availability as the primary bottleneck, a situation complicated by the reshaping influence of sovereign capital on global infrastructure deployment.

Read at Global Data Center Hub→

With Amazon Web Services planning a substantial $200 billion capital expenditure by 2026, the Vice President of Network Engineering, Matt Rehder, emphasized the cloud provider's strategic focus on artificial intelligence infrastructure, including developments like hollow-core fiber.

Read at Data Center Knowledge→

Firmus secured a $10 billion debt financing facility, led by Blackstone and Coatue, to support the rollout of its Project Southgate artificial intelligence factory infrastructure.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

Riley Thompson notes that the rapidly changing landscape of artificial intelligence infrastructure financing necessitates that chief financial officers re-evaluate their strategies for efficiently scaling compute resources and capital allocation.

Read at Data Center Knowledge→

 
Global AI chip manufacturing competition

Cisco introduced the Silicon One G300, a new 102.4 terabits per second ASIC, aiming to compete with Broadcom's Tomahawk 6 and Nvidia's Spectrum-X Ethernet Photonics by leveraging P4 programmability for large-scale artificial intelligence network clusters.

Read at The Register→

Taiwan's vice-premier has publicly stated that relocating forty percent of the nation's semiconductor manufacturing capacity to the United States, a goal set by the Trump administration, is geographically and logistically unfeasible.

Read at The Register→

 

Should the US continue pushing for significant semiconductor manufacturing relocation out of Taiwan?

The European Union has initiated the NanoIC pilot line, jointly funded by the EU, national governments, and ASML, to oversee the development of sub-2 nanometer chips within the continent.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

TSMC has reversed its prior plan for its second fabrication plant in Kumamoto, Japan, opting instead to produce three-nanometer artificial intelligence chips rather than the previously planned seven-nanometer components.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

 
Structural shifts in European markets

Europe's data center presence is quickly shifting away from traditional financial, logistics, administrative, and digital hubs, according to the latest industry report released by the European Data Center Association.

Read at Data Center Knowledge→

Virtus provides a profile detailing its strategy for redefining data center growth across the European market.

Read at Data Center POST→

 
AI governance and regulatory compliance

Brussels has accused Meta of violating European Union competition regulations by preventing rival artificial intelligence assistants from accessing WhatsApp, prompting consideration of emergency measures to mandate competitor access.

Read at The Register→

 

Should Brussels use emergency powers to force Meta to open WhatsApp data access for AI competitors?

In response to surging artificial intelligence rack densities, operators are transitioning from localized coolant distribution units to facility-scale liquid cooling platforms that enable warm-water, chillerless architectures for next-generation hyperscale data centers.

Read at Data Center Frontier  →

 
Chatter
The view from Reddit
“Did an ex-manager pull a really elaborate prank regarding alarm recording.”

The poster is driven to distraction manually transcribing hundreds of daily BMS alarms into an Excel spreadsheet, suspecting a decade-old policy mandated by a former manager is an absurd, non-standard prank that prevents automation.

Read at r/datacenter→

“Windows Server 2025 DCs: Defender not starting, PDQ Inventory scans hanging, Splashtop failing”

A critical boot-time regression on Windows Server 2025 Domain Controllers causes Microsoft Defender to fail initialization because it starts before the Group Policy hive is ready, a problem exacerbated by Splashtop, leaving servers potentially unprotected.

Read at r/sysadmin→

 

Should Microsoft prioritize a hotfix for the Defender/GPO conflict in Windows Server 2025 immediately?

“Unlabelled SMR hard drives are a cancer”

A technician recounts a month-long debugging saga involving inconsistent RAID performance, ultimately tracing the issue to secretly installed, unadvertised SMR drives from Seagate that were likely donated by an unaware previous owner.

Read at r/sysadmin→

 

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