SpaceX vets raise $50M Series A for data center connections

Travis Brashears, Cameron Ramos and Serena Grown-Haeberli began working at SpaceX, creating the optical communications links that keep the many Starlink satellites online at all times.

Now, the three engineers are the founders of Mesh Optical Technologies, a Los Angeles-based startup that announced a $50 million Series A round led by Thrive Capital on Tuesday.

Mesh aims to develop optical transceivers, devices that convert optical signals from fiber or lasers into electronic signals for computers. CEO Brashears, President Ramos, and Vice President of Product Grown-Haeberli recognized the opportunity to create a new generation of hungry SpaceX satellites forced them to evaluate the optical transceiver market, and they saw its limits.

Optical transceivers are especially important for data centers that train and use large-scale deep learning models, as they allow multiple GPUs to work together. One US-based firm, AOI, won the contract totaling $4 billion to provide AWS data center components last year.

“One will boast about a million GPU array; you have to multiply that by four to five because of the number of transceivers in that array,” Brashears said.

The company’s goal is to produce 1,000 units per day within a year so that it can start receiving more orders in 2027 and 2028.

The optical transceiver market is dominated by Chinese companies and suppliers, and Mesh sees an opportunity to build its footprint outside of the country. Although trade restrictions have not yet affected the market, the founders and their supporters see themselves as facing a national security crisis.

“If AI is the most important technology in a few generations (which we believe is true), having complex AI data center capex across the wrong/competing countries is a problem,” Thrive Partner Philip Clark wrote TechCrunch. “In short, Mesh solves our need for better communication methods if we want to continue to develop AI.”

The problem with Mesh, the founders say, is the power-off, automation process, which is not common in the US industry. So much technology is concentrated in China that even European equipment suppliers expect Chinese customers – a German company’s approval form asks for a Chinese company’s registration number.

By combining design and production, the founders hope to find more efficient and cost-effective components. Their current design eliminates one commonly used but power-hungry feature, which Ramos said can reduce the power consumption of GPU units by 3% to 5%, a significant amount as hyperscalers want to declutter their systems as much as possible.

The data center is just the beginning of Mesh’s ambitions; the company sees optical wavelength communications as the next paradigm in communications.

“The world has been focused on (radio) for a long time,” Brashears told TechCrunch. “We want to be at the forefront of the transition from RF to imaging…we want to connect everything, not just computers, but that’s where we’re starting.”