St Petersburg, FL and New York City, NY – 7th May 2024 – In an unprecedented partnership between space and architectural innovation, Lonestar Data Holdings Inc. (Lonestar) and the world-renowned architectural firm Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) proudly present the newly designed Freedom Payload, the first data center to be sent to space, set to journey to the Moon later this year aboard an Intuitive Machines lunar lander.
Building on the pioneering achievements of Lonestar’s Independence payload launched in February 2024—the first software-defined data center to operate from the Moon's surface and in Cislunar space —Freedom represents a monumental stride forward in Lonestar’s ongoing mission to expand cutting-edge digital infrastructure beyond Earth, housing data for a series of global customers ranging from governments, enterprise businesses, and leading NGOs involved in veteran affairs, human rights, and climate change, and testing machine learning, delay tolerant networks, radiation monitoring and more at the ultimate edge.
Crafted through a close partnership between BIG’s visionary architects and Lonestar’s team of entrepreneurs, engineers, and scientists, Freedom’s design is a marvel of innovation. Utilizing advanced 3D printing technology, BIG has seamlessly merged form and function to conceive a structure capable of withstanding the Moon’s harsh conditions, all while promoting sustainable practices in extraterrestrial environments.
“Freedom is not just a data center; it’s a symbol for all humanity of what the future holds,” said Chris Stott, CEO of Lonestar. “Through this partnership with BIG, we’ve been able to embody our commitment to advancing human knowledge and protecting the data that drives our civilization.”
The payload’s design also serves an inspirational purpose. Crafted like a sundial, its contours purposefully honor the legacy and future of space exploration by featuring the silhouettes of NASA astronauts Charles Duke and Nicole Stott. In the lunar morning, the face of Apollo 16 Moonwalker, Charles Duke, is cast in silhouette, symbolizing the achievements of the Apollo program. Transitioning past midday, the silhouette shifts to that of retired Spacewalker Nicole Stott, representing the progress and inclusivity of current and future missions under NASA's Artemis program. Artemis is the sister of Apollo.
This partnership marks a series of firsts: the first architectural design by BIG for a lunar data center, the first expansion of Lonestar’s lunar data centers, and a new chapter in humanity’s quest to become a multi-planetary species.
NASA Moonwalker Astronaut and Lonestar Advisory Board Member Charlie Duke, “It’s time to take those next steps. We built a foundation with Apollo for the future. Now let’s get out there and use it.”
NASA Spacewalker Astronaut Nicole Stott and Lonestar Advisory Board Member, “Everything we do in space - off the Earth - is ultimately for the benefit of all life on Earth; and data is at the heart of it all. By saving our data, we save our world.”
Lonestar and BIG invite the world to look to the Moon later this year as Freedom takes its place in history, serving both as a functional data hub and a symbol of human potential. For the first time as a species we’ve taken the first small crucial steps in protecting the data that underpins the foundation of our entire technological society. As Lonestar’s work grows for its customers, the goal is to provide global backup, global refresh, and global restore. Creating a literal living digital twin of our planet from a location, the Moon, that is so perfect for this if it wasn’t there we’d have to build it. Furthermore, as humanity transitions to a digital society with never-ending data needs, the expansion of data centers to the Moon provide an environmentally friendly means to simultaneously meet the needs of Earth while protecting the planet from carbon-heavy data centers.
About Lonestar Data Holdings Inc.:
Lonestar Data Holdings Inc. is pioneering a new class of premium data storage and edge processing services creating a premier data secure network to service terrestrial, space, and lunar based digital infrastructure. Lonestar will provide secure digital services for enterprise and government customers directly and through trusted Cloud service providers. Lonestar is currently conducting a series of lunar technology demonstration missions and will commence continuous commercial services in 2026.
For more information, please visit www.lonestarlunar.com or Contact: Stephen Eisele, media@lonestarlunar.com
About Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG):
BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group is a Copenhagen, New York, London, Barcelona, Shenzhen, Zurich, Los Angeles and Oslo-based group of architects, designers, urbanists, landscape professionals, interior and product designers, researchers, and inventors. Led by Bjarke Ingels, the studio is currently involved in projects throughout Europe, the Americas, Asia and the Middle East. BIG’s architecture emerges out of a careful analysis of how contemporary life constantly evolves and changes. BIG believes that by hitting the fertile overlap between pragmatic and utopia, architects can find the freedom to change the surface of our planet, to better fit contemporary life forms.
For more information, please visit www.big.dk or contact: Alyssa Snyder, press@big.dk
For more information, visit www.lonestar.com