Author Topic: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)  (Read 432054 times)

Offline llanitedave

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #940 on: 12/29/2015 04:30 pm »
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I think Blue Origin and ULA will eventually unite like Orbital-ATK. ULA has a lot of value as an experienced launch provider and BO has none, I think it is an excellent fit.

Because Bezos wants to be shackled to Boeing and Lockmart? I can't imagine that's his grand vision.


Depends on whether he's the shackl-er or the shackl-ee.
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Offline Kabloona

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #941 on: 12/29/2015 04:49 pm »
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Depends on whether he's the shackl-er or the shackl-ee.

Boeing 2014 revenue: $90B
LockMart 2014 net sales: $46B

Blue Origin 2014 revenue: ??

When you're shackled to two gorillas, there's not much doubt about who's in charge. And even if the gorillas somehow make you CEO, managing two gorillas is not as much fun as building your own rockets in your own sandbox, alone without the gorillas.
« Last Edit: 12/29/2015 04:55 pm by Kabloona »

Offline Toast

Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #942 on: 12/29/2015 04:51 pm »
I definitely think this will come down to whether Bezos is open to it. ULA will definitely be feeling some shareholder pressure after the Falcon 9 first stage return, and acquiring a company with recent VTOL experience could be a way to alleviate that pressure. For Blue Origin though, they have lofty long-term goals similar to SpaceX, and ULA isn't exactly known for being a company that innovates for innovation's sake alone, so they could be reluctant to tie themselves to that. Especially when, as others have mentioned, there would be no doubt that ULA would be the ones calling the shots from then on out.

Online Coastal Ron

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #943 on: 12/29/2015 05:01 pm »
I definitely think this will come down to whether Bezos is open to it.

I doubt it.  Bezos self funds Blue Origin, and he created Blue Origin to enable his own goals.

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ULA will definitely be feeling some shareholder pressure...

ULA is a wholly-owned joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin.  There are no ULA shareholders.

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Especially when, as others have mentioned, there would be no doubt that ULA would be the ones calling the shots from then on out.

No, Boeing and Lockheed Martin would be calling the shots, and they don't always agree on things.  Which is why the situation with the Vulcan is so unclear.

The recovery of the SpaceX 1st stage is hopefully going to inspire a lot of changes throughout the aerospace world.  Blue Origin selling itself to ULA is unlikely to be one of them...
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Online meekGee

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #944 on: 12/29/2015 05:29 pm »
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Depends on whether he's the shackl-er or the shackl-ee.

Boeing 2014 revenue: $90B
LockMart 2014 net sales: $46B

Blue Origin 2014 revenue: ??

When you're shackled to two gorillas, there's not much doubt about who's in charge. And even if the gorillas somehow make you CEO, managing two gorillas is not as much fun as building your own rockets in your own sandbox, alone without the gorillas.

Nah.  He'll be able to get ULA at his own terms, and Boeing and LMCO will feel blessed to be getting the deal.

For the corporate parents, once the sweet ride ends, ULA will become a liability.  Bezos, OTOH, has cash and can leverage ULA's connections to expedite BO's growth. From his point of view, what's not to like?
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Offline guckyfan

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #945 on: 12/29/2015 05:41 pm »
Nah.  He'll be able to get ULA at his own terms, and Boeing and LMCO will feel blessed to be getting the deal.

For the corporate parents, once the sweet ride ends, ULA will become a liability.  Bezos, OTOH, has cash and can leverage ULA's connections to expedite BO's growth. From his point of view, what's not to like?

I can imagine that even under such terms he would see ULA as a burden rather than an asset. He can hire the staff he needs from them. What would he do with the factories, the organizational overhead, the pads?

Offline Kabloona

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #946 on: 12/29/2015 05:42 pm »
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Nah.  He'll be able to get ULA at his own terms, and Boeing and LMCO will feel blessed to be getting the deal.

For the corporate parents, once the sweet ride ends, ULA will become a liability.  Bezos, OTOH, has cash and can leverage ULA's connections to expedite BO's growth. From his point of view, what's not to like?

So you're suggesting a buyout in which the parent corps have no further say in the enterprise. Which is different from Roy_H's thought that they would "unite,"  which sounded to me like a partnership.

Even so, does Bezos want to buy an aging, expensive legacy rocket that is already losing market share and has little chance of becoming commercially viable (Atlas V), or develop his own from scratch? Seems to me it's the latter.

All he needs to do is look at SpaceX's development costs. It cost SpaceX around $400 million to develop F1 and the first version of F9. Bezos could write a check like that tomorrow without breaking a sweat. He doesn't need anything from ULA except maybe some smart rats who desert their sinking ship.
« Last Edit: 12/29/2015 05:49 pm by Kabloona »

Offline rst

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #947 on: 12/29/2015 05:55 pm »
Quote
I think Blue Origin and ULA will eventually unite like Orbital-ATK. ULA has a lot of value as an experienced launch provider and BO has none, I think it is an excellent fit.

Because Bezos wants to be shackled to Boeing and Lockmart? I can't imagine that's his grand vision.

Also, ULA has experience as a launch provider to the government almost exclusively, and Blue may not want them as a customer.  Consider, for instance, the problems that SpaceX (remember SpaceX? This is a thread about SpaceX...) had dealing with the certification process for air force launches.  The consultants hired by the military were so intrusive that, following complaints from SpaceX, the Pentagon had to remind their own hired consultants that their job was to certify the design, not to change it.  Given Blue's generally secretive nature, which comes from the top, it's hard to see them putting up with that sort of process; if they want customers for anything soon, beyond the space tourism business that they're already pitching, the commercial market seems a much better fit.

Reference on the SpaceX certification issues: http://news.yahoo.com/u-air-force-overstepped-bounds-spacex-certification-report-200231213--finance.html

Offline abaddon

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #948 on: 12/29/2015 05:58 pm »
If anything like that were to happen, I believe it would happen after Vulcan.  So Atlas V and Delta IV are already retired, the pads are already consolidated down, and ULA is a much leaner and more competitive organization than it is right now.  Even then, it's not going to be making a lot of money in a much more competitive marketplace, so maybe Boeing and Lockheed agree to a buyout.

In that light, it seems less improbable to me.  Although not exactly likely.

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #949 on: 12/29/2015 05:59 pm »
Busy, but reacting to report to mods that this is wandering. Back on track folks (although I'll be starting Thread 13 soon).
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Offline Jim

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #950 on: 12/29/2015 08:03 pm »
Another benefit to bringing a stage home is the ability to add instrumentation to more closely monitor how systems are performing in flight.  SpaceX placed additional instrumentation in GH2, which was unfortunately lost.  With stage recovery, that investment in additional instrumentation is now recoverable.

For a reference, this is what the 787 looked like with flight test instrumentation.



Spacex has been putting less instrumentation on vehicles and that was the problem with figuring out what happening to the previous mission

Offline Mike Jones

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #951 on: 12/29/2015 09:00 pm »
I don't think the incumbents will take reuse of the entire stage seriously until SpaceX has paying customers flying on reused stages. 

Even if there are customers like SES that will pay to fly on a used first stage, it is questionable as to whether or not Ariane and ULA can change course from their current plans with Ariane 6and Vulcan.

Ariane 6 already has a $9 billion plan and signed contracts for development. The political fight to change course is probably not going to happen. It is just too painful and too many industrial base jobs are already committed to their $9 billion plan. So regardless what SpaceX proves with their first stage launching again, I think Ariane 6 is on a roadmap that won't change much.

There are probably many smart people in Europe that are shaking their heads at the stupidity of it all and wishing that they could start over on the design. However this is a political decision and there are lots of high paying union jobs involved.

I think the CEO of ULA (Bruno) realizes that they need to change to survive. But the hand he has been dealt makes it extraordinarily difficult.

My personal guess is that ULA will gradually fade away and BO will become the second dominant player in the launch market within the next 10 years.

The Ariane 6 development is far from Costing 9bn$ Of taxpayer's money. The Ariane 6 contracts signed by ESA this year are valued at ~3,3 bn$ (launcher for Airbus Safran + ground segment for CNES) at current FX and they cover also the initial exploitation until full cadence  in 2023 (8 years in total).

 If The Europeans meet their cost reduction targets, the Ariane 64 version Will be very competitive at around 100 M$ (For 2 satellites): much more competitive with spaceX than the current Vulcan from ULA. By the Way, Arianespace has been selling more expensive launch services than its competitors for 30+ years so they might have one or two qualities.
 Obviously for Ariane 6 to succeed that Will require confirmation of these cost reductions, limited delays ... and a number of layoffs in the european industry. But I think that is the main reason Behind the creation of the Airbus Safran Joint Venture + its majority shareholding in Arianespace. Avio is for sale too and could be restructured in the coming years as well.

No worries SpaceX is far from Having a Monopoly on the commercial Market (they are still the Third actor Behind Arianespace and Khrunichev/ILS today) and they won't most probably become a Monopoly on this worldwide Market in the foreseeable future. The same can be said on the US domestic market where the government Will keep at least 2 launch service providers with SpaceX + ULA teaming with BO (and maybe a side actor like OA).
« Last Edit: 12/29/2015 09:22 pm by Mike Jones »

Online jabe

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #952 on: 12/29/2015 09:28 pm »
I don't think the incumbents will take reuse of the entire stage seriously until SpaceX has paying customers flying on reused stages. 
my 2 cents..I figure a company will eventually  come out that will want to use the reused  1st stage and  will enable some other market to develop.  a prop depot precursor maybe?   Once the reliability of the reused boosters is determined,   a stronger business case can be developed around those numbers.  Spacex may have a two tiered price system. A "virgin" booster is one cost and  reused boosters lower.  Going to be interesting to see how things evolve.  First group to figure out the use of the reused boosters could do very well.  Who knows.
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Offline cscott

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #953 on: 12/29/2015 09:36 pm »
Virgin untested booster cheaper; reused and proven one more expensive.

Eventually, at least.
« Last Edit: 12/29/2015 09:37 pm by cscott »

Offline CyndyC

Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #954 on: 12/30/2015 02:06 am »
Virgin untested booster cheaper; reused and proven one more expensive.

Eventually, at least.

And even further out, maybe it will be as in the current airline industry, and won't matter WHAT you're flying just as long as you GET there, dependent only on market conditions. Elon Musk has repeatedly compared tossing a rocket to tossing an airplane.

BTW, is your counterintuitive assertion something you're certain will be true in the near future, or just a guess? Took me by surprise and probably a lot of other people. I can see some of the reasoning, but testing & retesting a vehicle that doesn't have to be completely rebuilt each time implies only incremental upcharges.
« Last Edit: 12/30/2015 02:07 am by CyndyC »
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Offline joek

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Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #955 on: 12/30/2015 02:38 am »
And even further out, maybe it will be as in the current airline industry, and won't matter WHAT you're flying just as long as you GET there, dependent only on market conditions. Elon Musk has repeatedly compared tossing a rocket to tossing an airplane.

BTW, is your counterintuitive assertion something you're certain will be true in the near future, or just a guess? Took me by surprise and probably a lot of other people. I can see some of the reasoning, but testing & retesting a vehicle that doesn't have to be completely rebuilt each time implies only incremental upcharges.

This is not counterintuitive.  It is how the commercial launch services market operates today.  Customer do not care what they are flying on, as long as they have sufficient confidence that the payload will get to the right place at the right time, and at the right price.  The primary difference is how each customer determines a  sufficient level of confidence.

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: General Falcon and Dragon discussion (Thread 12)
« Reply #956 on: 12/30/2015 11:53 am »
Really need the new thread now people continually drag this into ULA vs SpaceX.

Thread 13:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=39180.0
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