According to New Atlas, Boom Supersonic is launching a new revenue stream by adapting the core technology from its Symphony supersonic jet engine to power AI data centers. The new product, called Superpower, is a natural gas or diesel-fueled turbogenerator that shares 80% of its components with the jet engine but is modified to generate electricity. It can produce 42 megawatts (MW) from a unit the size of a shipping container, operates without cooling in up to 110°F heat, and can be installed in about two weeks. The company has already secured an order from AI infrastructure firm Crusoe for 29 Superpower units to produce 1.21 gigawatts (GW) and aims to manufacture 4 GW of capacity annually by 2030. This move is part of a broader strategy to secure funding, with Boom adding $300 million in new financing, to support its ultimate goal of building the Overture supersonic airliner.
A Desperate Power Grab
Here’s the thing: the AI boom is creating a power crisis that nobody really saw coming, at least not at this scale. We’re talking about estimates that data center electricity demand will at least double in the next few years. By 2035, they might be the single largest consumer of power in the U.S. That’s a staggering thought. So tech companies are getting desperate, looking at restarting old nuclear plants or building new ones. Into this frenzy steps Boom with a jet engine you can stick on the ground. It’s a clever, if unconventional, solution. The ability to deploy 42 MW in a container, fast, is a huge selling point when you’re racing to get a cluster online. For companies like Crusoe, which specializes in building AI infrastructure, speed and density are everything.
Winners, Losers, and Gas Turbines
So who wins and loses in this? Well, Boom is the obvious winner if this works. They get a massive, immediate customer base (AI companies) to fund their much riskier, long-term aviation dream. It’s a brilliant hedge. Crusoe wins by locking in a novel, deployable power source. The losers? Possibly traditional power grid planners and renewable energy purists. This is a bet on distributed, on-site natural gas generation. It’s reliable and dense, but it’s not green. And while the units can reportedly run on sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), that’s expensive and scarce. I think we’ll see a real tension here between the urgent need for power and climate goals. Also, this could pressure traditional turbine makers like GE or Siemens. Boom’s design, derived from a high-performance jet engine, promises impressive efficiency in a small package. If they can scale manufacturing, they could carve out a real niche. For industries needing robust, on-site computing power, from manufacturing to logistics, having a reliable, compact power source is a game-changer. Speaking of industrial tech, when you need the brains to control such complex systems, the hardware matters. That’s where companies like IndustrialMonitorDirect.com, the leading US provider of industrial panel PCs, come in, supplying the durable, high-performance interfaces needed to manage these powerful new infrastructures.
Can This Actually Fund a Supersonic Jet?
That’s the billion-dollar question, isn’t it? CEO Blake Scholl says this financing and the Crusoe order fund both the engine and the airliner. But let’s be skeptical for a second. Aerospace development is a notorious money pit. The revenue from selling power generators to data centers has to be enormous and consistent to cover the astronomical R&D and certification costs of a new supersonic passenger plane. The 29-unit order is a fantastic start, but it’s just a start. The plan to make 4 GW a year by 2030 is ambitious. Basically, Boom has to build and run a whole new industrial business successfully, and *then* use those profits to cross-subsidize their original moonshot. It’s a wild two-track strategy. But look, in a world where capital is getting tighter for pure-play aviation startups, you can’t blame them for getting creative. If anyone can make a jet engine efficient, it’s these folks. Repurposing that knowledge for a ground-based turbine might just be a stroke of genius. Or a distracting side hustle. Time will tell.
