ILS announce job losses

[Chris Bergin]

Not as dire as Sea Launch, but not great.

INTERNATIONAL LAUNCH SERVICES (ILS) ANNOUNCES STAFF REDUCTION

 

RESTON, VIRGINIA, Monday, August 2, 2014-International Launch Services (ILS), one of the leading providers of commercial launch services for the global satellite industry, announced a staff reduction today.  The staff reduction was conducted “to align better with our current level of business. None of the staff reductions were performance-related,” ILS President, Phil Slack said.

“Staffing at ILS is now at a level that is consistent with our near-term business, which required us to decrease our workforce by roughly 25%. This level of staffing is appropriate for our current backlog and our customers will continue to be well-supported. Previous staffing was consistent with planning for 7-8 launches per year. We are now targeting for 3-4 missions annually,” said Slack

“We continue to actively pursue new business.  If it is determined that we need to ramp up our existing staff to accommodate additional missions in the future, we will be able to accomplish this in a relatively rapid manner,” added Slack.

####

About ILS and Proton
The Proton launch vehicle has been heavily relied upon by the commercial satellite industry for over 20 years with a strong Federal anchor program.  Soon to be approaching its 300th launch over 49 years of service, the Proton vehicle has experienced a series of evolutionary improvements to meet the demands of the market.   ILS has the exclusive rights to market the Proton vehicle commercially.

[owais.usmani]

Previous staffing was consistent with planning for 7-8 launches per year. We are now targeting for 3-4 missions annually,” said Slack

I think I can see Elon Musk grinning from ear to ear 

[sdsds]

Maybe. But Sea Launch has dug for themselves the pit they find themselves in, needing no help from SpaceX. When you blow up your own launch platform, it hurts. When your rocket flies off in the wrong direction and "self-terminates" its flight, it hurts.

I hope they manage 3-4 missions a year. At least then the pit they've dug won't need to be their own grave...!

[Prof68]

Maybe. But Sea Launch has dug for themselves the pit they find themselves in, needing no help from SpaceX. When you blow up your own launch platform, it hurts. When your rocket flies off in the wrong direction and "self-terminates" its flight, it hurts.

I hope they manage 3-4 missions a year. At least then the pit they've dug won't need to be their own grave...!

And how precisely problems of Sea Launch (owned by RSC Energia and launching Zenit) corresponded with ILS (owned by Khrunichev and marketing Proton-M)?

[sdsds]

Oops! Thanks for that correction; I mis-remembered who was who!

[baldusi]

I don't believe it was ILS fault per se. Some of their problems was the increased Russian need for Proton-M for defense and government owned communications. The rest is Krunishev fault. They have made mistake after mistake, doing such a shameful work, that they have lost their 40 years monopoly on big space station to. RSC Energia.
Look at the the last ten years and most failures were on government launches. And they can't do squat about the fact that Russian payloads have priority.

[Galactic Penguin SST]

Well, besides poor reliability and Russian domestic needs on the rise, there's this reason that perhaps no player right now can fully mitigate (well, at least on paper  )....

Sat ops Econ 101 re: SpaceX. AsiaSat 8 launch cost AsiaSat $52.2M. Same sat on ILS Proton: $107M. Even w/ delays, the calculus is simple.

[Oli]

There are 9 Proton launches planned for 2015, around the same as in previous years, so the temporary (?) increase in domestic needs seems to be the main reason...

Well, besides poor reliability and Russian domestic needs on the rise, there's this reason that perhaps no player right now can fully mitigate (well, at least on paper  )....

Sat ops Econ 101 re: SpaceX. AsiaSat 8 launch cost AsiaSat $52.2M. Same sat on ILS Proton: $107M. Even w/ delays, the calculus is simple.

Falcon 9 has like half the payload in an equivalent GTO orbit.

[Lars_J]

There are 9 Proton launches planned for 2015, around the same as in previous years, so the temporary (?) increase in domestic needs seems to be the main reason...

Well, besides poor reliability and Russian domestic needs on the rise, there's this reason that perhaps no player right now can fully mitigate (well, at least on paper  )....

Sat ops Econ 101 re: SpaceX. AsiaSat 8 launch cost AsiaSat $52.2M. Same sat on ILS Proton: $107M. Even w/ delays, the calculus is simple.

Falcon 9 has like half the payload in an equivalent GTO orbit.

If the majority of the payloads do not take advantage of that payload capacity, how does it matter? Do you get a cheaper launch on Proton if you use less than the max payload capacity? No.

[owais.usmani]

http://www.spacenews.com/article/launch-report/41480struggling-ils-shedding-25-percent-of-staff

Reston, Virginia-based ILS has been suffering from three unrelated issues that have put pressure on its business.

The first is the spate of failures aboard the venerable Proton vehicle, all seemingly caused by disparate workforce-quality issues. These failures have occurred on Russian government missions but have nonetheless affected ILS, in large part by grounding the Proton.

The second is the rising tension between Russia and the West about Russia’s involvement in Ukraine. While this issue and the related Western sanctions against Russia have not yet forced ILS customers to cancel their launch plans, it has made it more difficult for ILS to regain traction in the market as it rebounds from the launch anomalies.

The third issue is what is likely a temporary market phenomenon. So far in 2014, the commercial satellites ordered have been mainly at the lighter end of the market for geostationary-orbiting telecommunications spacecraft. This follows a couple of years in which heavier satellites dominated.

Commercial Proton rockets are typically used to launch heavier satellites one at a time. The market’s move to lighter spacecraft has benefited Space Exploration Technologies Corp. of Hawthorne, California, whose Falcon 9 rocket has accumulated commercial orders; and also benefited Arianespace, whose Ariane 5 heavy-lift vehicle’s lower position is reserved for smaller satellites.

[Nicolas PILLET]

If the majority of the payloads do not take advantage of that payload capacity, how does it matter?

See the launch mass history of ILS :

http://www.kosmonavtika.com/basesorga/ils/ils.html

Some facts, based on this table :

- 85 launches achieved by ILS
- Mean Launch mass : 4595kg
- 36 of these launches had a mass over 4850kg (F-9 v1.1 capacity, according to Gunter Krebs website)

It means that 42% of ILS payloads could not have been launched by F-9 v1.1.

[owais.usmani]

- 36 of these launches had a mass over 4850kg (F-9 v1.1 capacity, according to Gunter Krebs website)

so how would this happen? Does this goes super-synchronous?

http://www.spacenews.com/article/satellite-telecom/41500proton-delays-push-global-availability-of-inmarsat-ka-band-service-to

Being built by Thales Alenia Space of France and Italy, the satellite, which Inmarsat calls EuropaSat, is scheduled for launch in late 2016. Though nominally slated to launch on the Falcon Heavy, the 5,900-kilogram satellite also could launch on a Falcon 9, Inmarsat has said.

[Nicolas PILLET]

- 36 of these launches had a mass over 4850kg (F-9 v1.1 capacity, according to Gunter Krebs website)

so how would this happen? Does this goes super-synchronous?

http://www.spacenews.com/article/satellite-telecom/41500proton-delays-push-global-availability-of-inmarsat-ka-band-service-to

Being built by Thales Alenia Space of France and Italy, the satellite, which Inmarsat calls EuropaSat, is scheduled for launch in late 2016. Though nominally slated to launch on the Falcon Heavy, the 5,900-kilogram satellite also could launch on a Falcon 9, Inmarsat has said.

I don't know, but Gunter's data seems to be true, since the SpaceX's website also says 4850kg...

http://www.spacex.com/falcon9

[baldusi]

- 36 of these launches had a mass over 4850kg (F-9 v1.1 capacity, according to Gunter Krebs website)

so how would this happen? Does this goes super-synchronous?

http://www.spacenews.com/article/satellite-telecom/41500proton-delays-push-global-availability-of-inmarsat-ka-band-service-to

Being built by Thales Alenia Space of France and Italy, the satellite, which Inmarsat calls EuropaSat, is scheduled for launch in late 2016. Though nominally slated to launch on the Falcon Heavy, the 5,900-kilogram satellite also could launch on a Falcon 9, Inmarsat has said.

I don't know, but Gunter's data seems to be true, since the SpaceX's website also says 4850kg...

http://www.spacex.com/falcon9

After the Thaicom-6 launch, a Spx official stated that they had reserved 300kg of margin, and thus the actual performance would be 5,150kg. That's to a 1,800m/s deficit GTO, which probably is supersynch. I would guess that such a satellite could simply use SEP to compensate for a bigger delta-v deficit.