UPDATED 12:09 EDT / JULY 23 2021

AI

Hypergiant, SUSE take Kubernetes clusters and AI to Earth’s outer edge

Edge computing has taken technology and data storage to literally anywhere, even into the most hostile environments like space.

The artificial intelligence company Hypergiant LLC and the open-source enterprise software company SUSE Group have joined forces to put Kubernetes clusters, AI and machine learning to work in orbit on military satellites, for the very first time.

“I think the first thing that we learned [is] that I think it’s an understatement to say that space is hard, but it really is … and a lot of it had to do with just government and logistics,” said Bren Briggs (pictured), vice president of DevSecOps at Hypergiant. “We learned that it is difficult a lot of times to just to find a way to get into space and then, once you’re there, how you operate in the conditions that you’re in and how you could even communicate with your satellite is just a logistical adventure on top of all of the other engineering problems that you have while you’re on low Earth orbit.”

Briggs spoke with Lisa Martin, host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, for a digital CUBE Conversation. They discussed Hypergiant’s focus on cutting-edge technology, the company’s partnership with SUSE to provide solutions for defense and space-based missions, and the usage trends of Kubernetes at the edge. (* Disclosure below.)

K3s solve multiple issues faced by satellites

After a contract with the U.S. Air Force to write an experiment with some new sensing technology onboard a satellite, Hypergiant got involved with a new group within the Air Force called Platform One, which mission is to bring DevSecOps to the Department of Defense DevSecOps Enterprise Services.

“And so that was kind of the start of this whole idea … what do we do and how do we do DevSecOps in low Earth orbit? Can we put Kubernetes on satellite and will it work?” Briggs said.

The solution was to use K3s to solve multiple issues faced by the satellite industry. Space-rated hardware is costly, and software development and delivery processes are slow. On-orbit satellite software updates are often not possible or incredibly time-consuming and expensive. As a result, AI/ML capabilities are far behind those currently available on Earth.

K3s reduce the dependencies and steps needed to install, run and auto-update a production Kubernetes cluster and enable Hypergiant to deploy the modern, lightweight software systems that will drive the next evolution and commoditization of the satellite industry.

“K3s is a very lightweight Kubernetes distribution that had really good opinions. It’s a single binary. It was very easy to deploy and manage and update, and … it really didn’t break,” Briggs explained. “That was the best thing that we were looking for.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s CUBE Conversations(* Disclosure: This segment was sponsored by Rancher Labs Inc. Neither Rancher Labs nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE

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