Unfortunately for Astra time isn't on their side. There are few 1000-1500kg class LVs coming on line in next year or two. These have similar $kg and compete head on in constellation launch market that Astra are targeting.
Quote from: TrevorMonty on 05/13/2022 05:53 pmUnfortunately for Astra time isn't on their side. There are few 1000-1500kg class LVs coming on line in next year or two. These have similar $kg and compete head on in constellation launch market that Astra are targeting. Is that the whole picture of the market they are targeting though? My impression is that they, Virgin Orbit, and ABL have a major emphasis on national security/responsive space payloads for governments globally. While I am sure they would love to do commercial constellations if they can land some of that business, I am not sure that their business model is primarily reliant on that gamble.
Realisation slowly dawning that almost none of the small launch New Space companies’ business cases make sense.They require improbably high launch rates to justify the significant investments made to get to orbit, let alone support continuing operations thereafter.
Very slim possibility, but I'd be darned if all TROPICS cubesats will be taken by SpaceX as an exclusive rideshare at the last second. Not referring to Transporter since that goes to SSO only.Or maybe I'm just joking.
Quote from: Blackjax on 05/13/2022 07:32 pmQuote from: TrevorMonty on 05/13/2022 05:53 pmUnfortunately for Astra time isn't on their side. There are few 1000-1500kg class LVs coming on line in next year or two. These have similar $kg and compete head on in constellation launch market that Astra are targeting. Is that the whole picture of the market they are targeting though? My impression is that they, Virgin Orbit, and ABL have a major emphasis on national security/responsive space payloads for governments globally. While I am sure they would love to do commercial constellations if they can land some of that business, I am not sure that their business model is primarily reliant on that gamble. There's definitely a market for quick-response launches for governments that don't depend on fixed ground infrastructure, but I can't imagine that market is very large, either in terms of "number of providers which it can sustain" or "number of launches it will entail." Astra in particular appears to be ill-suited to this market, because a handful of contracts from the military doesn't give them the extremely high flight rates they seem to be depending on for economies of scale. Someone like ABL, which may be better-positioned to capture the commercial market with their much larger launcher (that still allegedly costs the same as Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne) would be my bet to win here.
Quote from: M.E.T. on 05/14/2022 01:32 amRealisation slowly dawning that almost none of the small launch New Space companies’ business cases make sense.They require improbably high launch rates to justify the significant investments made to get to orbit, let alone support continuing operations thereafter.Those high launch rates were there before the "Raidshare" rides offer by the those folks from Hawthorne suck up most of the smallsat payloads.
Quote from: Zed_Noir on 05/14/2022 01:44 amQuote from: M.E.T. on 05/14/2022 01:32 amRealisation slowly dawning that almost none of the small launch New Space companies’ business cases make sense.They require improbably high launch rates to justify the significant investments made to get to orbit, let alone support continuing operations thereafter.Those high launch rates were there before the "Raidshare" rides offer by the those folks from Hawthorne suck up most of the smallsat payloads.So (not directed at you, I’m just wondering) did the small launch start ups in the 2015-2020 period just hope like hell that the Hawthorne crowd would not succeed in rapid reuse? Because cheap rideshare was a logical consequence of low cost access to orbit.Nothing about the current situation was not easily foreseeable. In fact, many of us did just that. Foresee it that is. And proclaim it to all who would listen.
Quote from: M.E.T. on 05/14/2022 04:23 amQuote from: Zed_Noir on 05/14/2022 01:44 amQuote from: M.E.T. on 05/14/2022 01:32 amRealisation slowly dawning that almost none of the small launch New Space companies’ business cases make sense.They require improbably high launch rates to justify the significant investments made to get to orbit, let alone support continuing operations thereafter.Those high launch rates were there before the "Raidshare" rides offer by the those folks from Hawthorne suck up most of the smallsat payloads.So (not directed at you, I’m just wondering) did the small launch start ups in the 2015-2020 period just hope like hell that the Hawthorne crowd would not succeed in rapid reuse? Because cheap rideshare was a logical consequence of low cost access to orbit.Nothing about the current situation was not easily foreseeable. In fact, many of us did just that. Foresee it that is. And proclaim it to all who would listen.Opinions about lack of demand for dedicated smallsat launches are somewhat disproved by the current data.For example, as of February 2022 Rocket Lab has a $545m backlog:-https://finance.yahoo.com/news/rocket-lab-announces-fourth-quarter-210500598.htmlThat's 50-70 launches (depending on price) of demand locked in for one small launcher. That's quite a manifest.
https://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/1526607162025328642QuoteJanet Petro, director of KSC, showed this slide of 2022 key milestones at a Space Transportation Association event.It shows Artemis 1’s launch no earlier than August.Astra’s three launches of NASA’s TROPICS CubeSats are TBD as Astra is “working through some issues,” she said.
Janet Petro, director of KSC, showed this slide of 2022 key milestones at a Space Transportation Association event.It shows Artemis 1’s launch no earlier than August.Astra’s three launches of NASA’s TROPICS CubeSats are TBD as Astra is “working through some issues,” she said.
Quote from: ZachS09 on 05/14/2022 02:57 amVery slim possibility, but I'd be darned if all TROPICS cubesats will be taken by SpaceX as an exclusive rideshare at the last second. Not referring to Transporter since that goes to SSO only.Or maybe I'm just joking.6 cubesats isn't much of launch contract. Sent from my SM-G570Y using Tapatalk
The significance of the TROPICS mission for Astra lies in Astra competing and winning against SpaceX, Virgin Orbit, Rocket Lab (and Momentus) for that launch contract. NASA's conclusions in the "Evaluation of Proposals" part turned out to be pretty accurate. The TROPICS decision document is here: https://govtribe.com/file/government-file/tropics-decision-document-signed-dot-pdf
Quote from: josephus on 05/18/2022 09:07 pmThe significance of the TROPICS mission for Astra lies in Astra competing and winning against SpaceX, Virgin Orbit, Rocket Lab (and Momentus) for that launch contract. NASA's conclusions in the "Evaluation of Proposals" part turned out to be pretty accurate. The TROPICS decision document is here: https://govtribe.com/file/government-file/tropics-decision-document-signed-dot-pdfCompeting and losing $250M/year is debatable for if it's winning. I do think it's still exciting to see so much general innovation and talent being bred to develop LVs but I question if astra is really competing. Seems like they've bought a lot of IP and they need to see if they can manufacture cheaply enough and fly often enough to make their low prices real. An interesting/exciting position for sure, regardless of what you think of them.
Side note, you should have put virgin orbit in quotes since they were the only one not even considered in this decision, apparently due to noncompetitive pricing.
The three TROPICS launches TBD:Quote from: scr00chy on 05/17/2022 06:38 pmhttps://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/1526607162025328642QuoteJanet Petro, director of KSC, showed this slide of 2022 key milestones at a Space Transportation Association event.It shows Artemis 1’s launch no earlier than August.Astra’s three launches of NASA’s TROPICS CubeSats are TBD as Astra is “working through some issues,” she said.
Shouldn't Astra get its own subsection in the "COMMERCIAL AND US GOVERNMENT LAUNCH VEHICLES" section?
Quote from: josephus on 05/30/2022 08:01 pmShouldn't Astra get its own subsection in the "COMMERCIAL AND US GOVERNMENT LAUNCH VEHICLES" section?Please yes