Alan Anderson wrote:
wrote:

However the only people with experience of rockets are goverment
agencies (like NASA, ESA etc.) and the military.

Which are you considering commercial entities like Boeing to be,
government agencies or military?

COTS is therefore out.

I think SpaceDev would disagree with you. As would their customers --
including, potentially, NASA.

Rockets however have to either be ordered from governments or built
from scratch.

Or they might be obtained from the same place The Spaceship Company is
getting theirs.

I looked through the various items in the Website. There is one
possibility - Not exactly COTS but defintely cost reducing. That is to
go to Russia. Design a spaceship - lets say for the sake of argument a
completely recoverable 2STO and get in bult in Russia to your design.
Register as a Russian/European company and that will get round any
expoer controls.

An equatorial (rather than a Central Asian) launch would be
advantageous. This could be done from Kourou of somewhere else in South
America viz Brazil.

There is one definite difference between a commercial and a Goverment
enterprise. With a Goverment enterprise orders follow the flag and
there is often secrecy which again reduces efficiency. A commercial
enterprise must go to the lowest price and highest quality, avoiding
setting up in countries (like tghe US) imposing export controls. The
lowest price and highest quality in rockets is to be found in Russia.
The best launch site is Kourou. For a major initiative Brazil. Brazil
at the moment lacks infrastructure.