Quote from: RedLineTrain on 08/01/2017 08:42 pmAlphabet, which has more cash on hand than Bezos has in total assets.... but zillion other projects to fund. They are only funding the internet satellite project of spacex.
Alphabet, which has more cash on hand than Bezos has in total assets.
and, Elon is allowing NOBODY to invest so much into spaceX that he loses his >50% stake of it, until there is a colony on Mars. He has made it quite clear.The whole purpose of SpaceX is mars colonization, and giving up his majority stake would endanger that.
Quote from: hkultala on 08/01/2017 08:35 pmWhat "book of business"?Last I heard, the SpaceX "book of business" includes about $10 billion in revenue. And given this is the rocket business, SpaceX gets progress payments.
What "book of business"?
...This is not very much for developing new rockets and world's most advances rocket engines...
The fact that Elon is having to raise several hundred million at this point makes me wonder if he's dealing with cashflow problems from having overspent progress payments on reusability R&D.
Quote from: hkultala on 08/01/2017 09:03 pmand, Elon is allowing NOBODY to invest so much into spaceX that he loses his >50% stake of it, until there is a colony on Mars. He has made it quite clear.The whole purpose of SpaceX is mars colonization, and giving up his majority stake would endanger that.Not a concern. He has 78% voting control.
Quote from: jongoff on 08/02/2017 04:44 amThe fact that Elon is having to raise several hundred million at this point makes me wonder if he's dealing with cashflow problems from having overspent progress payments on reusability R&D.Spending more money on R&D than your customers have financed is not indicative of "overspending" or "cashflow problems" in the venture-funded world in which SpaceX operates. It is taken as a given that a young, growing business does this.
Additionally, SpaceX has to do at least an annual "liquidity round" for employees and others to be able to sell SpaceX stock for personal purposes. Relatively small numbers like these (hundreds of millions in a company valued now over $20B) likely don't reflect SpaceX needing to raise capital.
Not to go too far off topic but is this annual liquidity round for employees a requirement or just a common practice? Does it have to be annual? And how is Blue doing this, do employees get options to enhance retention? or is Bezos the sole owner? I can't recall hearing about any liquidity rounds... That's an area where one or the other may have competitive advantage...
Quote from: Lar on 08/17/2017 04:20 pmNot to go too far off topic but is this annual liquidity round for employees a requirement or just a common practice? Does it have to be annual? And how is Blue doing this, do employees get options to enhance retention? or is Bezos the sole owner? I can't recall hearing about any liquidity rounds... That's an area where one or the other may have competitive advantage...It is common among large unicorns that have private for many years. E.g., Uber. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-02-15/uber-gives-restless-employees-a-way-to-cash-out
thanks. Question still stands, does anyone know what Blue is doing? Do employees get only salary? Is that an advantage or disadvantage? Does it attract different sorts of people (I would think so... )
Thinking more about this from the "SX competition" thread elsewhere.It would appear that all providers (including potential new ones large and small), are becoming more "gradual". Even SX's rapid pace of development/flight test appears to have slowed from the frenetic pace of landing/engine performance/chilled props/other. ...What happens to upset this, where "good enough" isn't "better"?
Proposed development optionsCNES began studies in 2010[35] on an alternative, reusable first stage for Ariane 6, using a mix of liquid oxygen and liquid methane rather than hydrogen in the current Ariane 6 first-stage design. The methane-powered core would use one or more engines, matching capabilities of Ariane 64 with only two boosters instead of four. Economic feasibility of reusing an entire stage however remains in question. Con-current with the Liquid fly-back booster research in the late 90s and early 00s CNES along with Russia concluded studies indicating that reusing the first stage was economically unviable as manufacturing ten rockets a year was cheaper and more feasible than recovery, refurbishment and loss of performance caused by reusability.[36]Main article: Adeline (rocket stage)In June 2015, Airbus Defence and Space announced that development of Adeline, a partially reusable first stage, would become operational between 2025 and 2030, and that it would be developed as a subsequent first stage for Ariane 6. Rather than developing a way to reuse an entire first stage (like SpaceX), Airbus proposed a system where only high-value parts would be safely returned using a winged module at the bottom of the rocket stack.[35]In August 2016 Airbus Safran Launchers gave some more details about future development plans building on the Ariane 6 design. CEO Alain Charmeau revealed that Airbus Safran were now working along two main lines: first, continuing work (at the company's own expense) on the recoverable Adeline engine-and-avionics module; and second, beginning development of a next-generation engine to be called Prometheus. This engine would have about the same thrust as the Vulcain 2 currently powering Ariane 5, but would burn methane instead of liquid hydrogen. Charmeau was non-committal about whether Prometheus (still only in the first few months of development) could be used as an expendable replacement for the Vulcain 2 in Ariane 6, or whether it was tied to the re-usable Adeline design, saying only that "We are cautious, and we prefer to speak when are sure of what we announce. ... But certainly this engine could very well fit with the first stage of Ariane 6 one day".[3] In 2017 the Prometheus engine project was revealed to have the aim of reducing the engine unit cost from the €10m of the Vulcain2 to €1m and allowing the engine to be reused up to five times.[37]
The issue overall with what you suggest is that they need sufficient reason. AG, in the best position, has some but a full plate so will have to creatively rework multiple programs on the fly w/o letting anything drop. ULA's marching orders don't contain a possibility of it, and they don't need it for the launches they've signed up for.
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Suggest a variation on 3. That Boeing/LM shift to spacecraft production that takes advantage of launch frequency/immediacy to ramp volume of payloads. Then, there would be a reason once again for in house launch capability to meet the demand, for a subset of customers not comfortable with SX.
If you're (Boeing/LM) so good, why not spin out (as is done in Silicon Valley - Cisco did this a lot) - a startup, co-financed with venture, conquer a part of the SC space, and acquire it again back into the main company. High capital reuse, keeps company culture end to end, secures inaccessible parts of the market, and you don't risk anything but your initial stake. When it works, you own all that market, and increase your market cap.
QuoteIf you're (Boeing/LM) so good, why not spin out (as is done in Silicon Valley - Cisco did this a lot) - a startup, co-financed with venture, conquer a part of the SC space, and acquire it again back into the main company. High capital reuse, keeps company culture end to end, secures inaccessible parts of the market, and you don't risk anything but your initial stake. When it works, you own all that market, and increase your market cap.More likely is their buying one or more of the players in the game just as they gobbled up the space launch and spacecraft players. That only reduced competition, advancing the technology approximately zero. Once the satellite industry enters a Silicon Valley-like development cycle, lumbering old school companies are in trouble. IBM, GE, others tried to push into the personal computing revolution...
New players like Blue and some of the small launcher/small satellite start-ups will own chunks of the field if history is any indication. Figuring out who and how is the challenge. Silicon Valley in the 1970s/80s all over again.
I'll say this much, I've never known so many people act like they are falling over each other to join BO. Sadly, if understandably, it's because they are offering incredible salaries and benefits - easily the best in the business...."by a massive margin".