If data centers in space end up being economically viable, then I don't see how anyone can catch SpaceX. They are ten years ahead in both launch capability and satellite manufacturing.

Chinese rockets companies are evolving at insane pace, including RLVs. A couple of big milestones have been achieved this year alone, like first stage landing.

I certainly hope ‘economically viable’ includes properly priced externalities for e.g. side effects of burning hundreds and hundreds of tonnes of aluminium and other materials in the high atmosphere.

This guy is obviously long SpaceX

That's the fun part, they don't need to be viable. It's just the excuse to shovel tons of money to Trump donors, by rerunning the scam that was SDI.

And they never will be because it's always going to be cheaper to build them on the ground.

No western company, no. That's why I can only hope SpaceX can get thru more red tape faster, and future administrations don't try to slow them down.

Even while current administration is kind of positive towards them, they are still even now just having to wait for no good reason for a FAA go-ahead. These kinds of stalls don't really exist in China.