Early Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:SPCX) investor Steve Jurvetson is backing two former leaders who worked at Elon Musk’s space company, aiming to solve AI’s rising electricity demand with off-grid solar and battery systems for data centers.
Jurvetson Backs Solar Storage Cost Overhaul
Jurvetson, who continues to serve as a director for SpaceX, announced on Wednesday that venture firm DFJ Growth, an enterprise where he is a partner, is investing in a startup named Ambrosia Energy, founded by Ben Longmier and Sara Spangelo.
"The endgame for datacenter power is solar, but it’s held back by storage and installation costs," Jurvetson wrote on X, saying Ambrosia targets electricity at about $100 per megawatt-hour, 99.9% availability and deployment within one year.
☀️ I brainstormed a tagline for our latest investment,
— Steve Jurvetson (@FutureJurvetson) August 12, 2026
Ambrosia Energy: "Sweet, sweet nectar of the sun gods!"
The endgame for datacenter power is solar, but it’s held back by storage and installation costs. Ambrosia is optimizing solar + storage as a service: $100/MWh at 99.9%… pic.twitter.com/Eb5yLTwAJj
Ambrosia says it vertically integrates land acquisition, permitting, engineering, battery manufacturing and construction. Its system combines solar with 24-hour lithium-iron-phosphate battery storage, while a proprietary installation method is designed to deploy panels 12 times faster than conventional approaches.
Jurvetson argued that plunging panel and battery-cell prices have made hardware just 10% to 20% of overall system costs, leaving installation and development as the bigger targets for savings. Ambrosia aims to reverse that ratio by stripping out nonessential infrastructure.
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SpaceX Veterans Target Rapid Energy Deployment
"A power plant should be able to be built at any scale in 12 months from contract signing to power on," Spangelo said.
The founders bring satellite-industry experience to that task. Spangelo and Longmier co-founded Swarm Technologies, which SpaceX acquired in 2021, before helping lead Starlink Mobile. Ambrosia says its West Texas pilot has operated continuously and that its next project targets 200 MW of solar capacity delivering 20 MW of continuous power.
AI Boom Intensifies Data Center Demand
Their bet comes as AI’s electricity requirements increasingly emerge as a constraint. The Energy Department says data centers could consume about 11.8% of U.S. electricity by 2030.
Reuters recently reported that U.S. data-center power demand could surge nearly 360% between 2026 and 2030, while gas-turbine lead times averaged roughly five years in 2025. Falling solar and storage costs are consequently pushing developers toward faster hybrid projects.
That mirrors Elon Musk’s own push toward solar-powered AI infrastructure. Jurvetson sees another SpaceX technology expanding the opportunity. "With Starlink, data centers can be anywhere there’s energy," he wrote. "With off-grid solar, that energy can be anywhere, relaxing the constraints of geography."
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