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Launching a New Era: SpaceX vs. ULA
"The U.S. Air Force, NASA and the National Reconnaissance
Office have finally issued a first-of-a-kind strategy for certifying new entrants seeking to compete for national security space launches. This is not a change for NASA, which already works with commercial launch companies, but the strategy lays out new criteria for companies seeking to break into the market for national security launches. Though not solely intended to address companies seeking to loft larger satellites, this new criteria will set the stage for a likely duel between Space Exploration Technologies and its young Falcon 9 and the United Launch Alliance's Atlas V and Delta IV vehicles, which boast a record of 43 successes." See: http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/blogs...tId=b logDest |
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Launching a New Era: SpaceX vs. ULA
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Launching a New Era: SpaceX vs. ULA
David Spain wrote:
wrote: this new criteria will set the stage for a likely duel between Space Exploration Technologies and its young Falcon 9 and the United Launch Alliance's Atlas V and Delta IV vehicles, which boast a record of 43 successes." Once Falcon 9 establishes a track record, look at the fixed costs. That will determine the winner. Dave That is of course, too simplistic. I don't expect ULA or any other supplier to just sit still. If their fixed costs are too high they will offer alternatives. They'll have to. Dave |
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Launching a New Era: SpaceX vs. ULA
On 15/10/2011 9:04 AM, David Spain wrote:
David Spain wrote: wrote: this new criteria will set the stage for a likely duel between Space Exploration Technologies and its young Falcon 9 and the United Launch Alliance's Atlas V and Delta IV vehicles, which boast a record of 43 successes." Once Falcon 9 establishes a track record, look at the fixed costs. That will determine the winner. Dave That is of course, too simplistic. I don't expect ULA or any other supplier to just sit still. If their fixed costs are too high they will offer alternatives. They'll have to. Dave They may not be able to. They've been in the business so long with these habits that it may be impossible for them to change. If they can offer lower-cost alternatives, one must wonder why it has taken 50 years to do so. |
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Launching a New Era: SpaceX vs. ULA
Alan Erskine wrote:
If they can offer lower-cost alternatives, one must wonder why it has taken 50 years to do so. Because no-one forced them to. I blame the space-race mentality (which was actually an arms-race mentality) that created the expensive "business-as-usual" practices of the defense contractors. Until COTS came along. There will be ramifications in DoD contracts as a side-effect to NASA's COTS that are only now becoming clear I think. This is like one of those James Burke 'Connections' episodes only playing out in slower real-time. Dave |
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