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Cowboy Space, a California-based aerospace and advanced manufacturing firm, has leased a 291,035-square-foot industrial parcel of land in Kent, where it will transform a former Costco warehouse into a specialized, advanced manufacturing operation supporting space and rocket development, Newmark Real Estate announced this month.
Smack in the center of Kent’s industrial corridor, Newmark, a New York-based commercial and industrial real estate leader, facilitated the lease with Cowboy Space’s new landlord, Centerpoint Properties. The site, 7650 S. 228th St., is close to an ever-growing concentration of aerospace and space technology companies, among them Blue Origin, Stoke Space and Boeing.
Like those companies, Cowboy Space will have access to a highly skilled workforce supported by decades of aerospace manufacturing activity throughout the Puget Sound region. The company will develop solar-powered orbital data centers to address the growing power and infrastructure demands of artificial intelligence.
To make it happen, Newmark said, Cowboy Space will set up an assortment of satellites called the Stampede Constellation as megawatt-class GPU data centers. Those satellites will tap the abundant solar power in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), They are designed to be integrated units with the rocket’s upper stage, minimizing redundant mass and maximizing computing capacity.
The company aims to send its own rockets into LEO starting as early as 2028, with the Stampede Constellation as a flagship project.
Newmark said that the company expects to add about 300 new jobs to the region’s growing aerospace industry.
According to a write-up in the online publication, Geekwire, the system aims to bypass two major sticking points for Earth-based AI:• Energy demand — Earth’s power grid can’t keep pace with AI growth; and• Land, water, and cooling constraints — traditional data centers require vast resources.“This building was originally designed for large-scale logistics users, but Cowboy Space recognized the opportunity to re-imagine it as a highly specialized production facility,” said Newmark Vice Chairman Taylor Hoff, one half of the team that represented the landlord in the transaction. “We’re seeing growing demand from aerospace and advanced manufacturing companies that need significant power, large floor plates and access to engineering talent, and the Kent Valley is uniquely positioned to meet those requirements.”Bill Ellis, city of Kent chief economic development officer, said it’s another step forward for the local aerospace industry.“This lease is exactly the kind of investment that the city of Kent has been working toward for years,” Ellis said in the Newmark report. “We recognized early on that the future of the Kent Valley wasn’t just traditional distribution, but advanced manufacturing, aerospace and next-generation space companies.”
“Cowboy Space’s decision to establish a major presence here helps validate that vision,” Ellis said.
According to Newmark Research, this transaction is the largest industrial lease in the Puget Sound region so far this year.
Attempts to reach Cowboy Space for comment were unsuccessful.
