Ryan Duffy
Pathfinder #0020, featuring Epsilon3’s Laura Crabtree
We’re 20 weeks into publishing the Pathfinder podcast—and we have a great episode in store for you to mark the occasion. Our guest is Laura Crabtree, cofounder and CEO of Epsilon3. Today’s episode is brought to you by Spaced Ventures, Pathfinder’s new sponsor.The company is building the world’s first space investment portal, offering direct access…
ULA Launches Pair of SES Communications Satellites
On Tuesday evening, a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral with precious cargo: SES-20 and -21. The American launch provider successfully deployed the satellites for SES, their owner and operator, roughly six hours later into a near-geosynchronous orbit. SES bought the two birds from Boeing in 2020. The all-electric satellites…
Pathfinder #0019, featuring Chris Kemp
Pathfinder is back on the rocket beat, and today, we’re getting a much-needed company update from Astra ($ASTR) CEO Chris Kemp. Today’s episode is brought to you by SpiderOak Mission Systems. Take the Payload/SpiderOak survey here. The backstory: Astra’s first launch of NASA’s TROPICS satellites ended in failure this summer. Shortly thereafter, Astra scrapped all flights for…
Firefly Launches Into the Black
Firefly Aerospace successfully reached orbit early in the morning on Saturday, October 1. The Cedar Park, TX company’s Alpha FLT002 mission lifted off from Vandenberg’s Space Launch Complex 2 shortly after midnight Pacific. Stage separation occurred roughly 2.5 minutes after lift off, and Alpha reached orbit shortly before T+8 minutes. Firefly deemed the orbital journey…
Q2 2022 Orbital Launches, by the Numbers
Editor’s note: BryceTech’s report was released last month, not this week. We missed the original release and mistakenly thought the report was new when we recently came across it. Payload regrets the error. BryceTech’s latest quarterly launch briefing is out. These reports are the gold standard for rocket data. We read ‘em, reread them, and…
Starlink Passes Two Million Downloads in 2022
The Starlink mobile app has 2M+ downloads in 2022, per third-party estimates from 42matters, a Swiss mobile intelligence provider. The tally includes both installs on Android’s Google Play marketplace and the iOS App Store. Starlink saw ~90,000 downloads over the weekend, 42matters’ Alexander Braelow told Payload. The spike occurred shortly after SpaceX activated Starlink in…
Pathfinder #0018, with Brian Barritt
We’re back for Round 3 of the Pathfinder from Paris experience. Just days after Aalyria Technologies emerged from stealth mode, Ryan sat down with Brian Barritt, the startup’s CTO. Aalyria leverages technology from various Google advanced development programs and aims to build speedy, secure networks spanning land, sea, air, LEO, and deep space. How do…
SpaceX Activates Starlink in Iran
Protests in Iran reached their 10th night and 50 cities over the weekend, following the death of Mahsa Amini in custody. A digital curtain descends… In response to anti-government protests, Tehran has throttled internet access and mobile networks and blocked WhatsApp and Instagram, popular Western services within the country. NetBlocks, Cloudflare, and OONI are documenting…
Planet, Microsoft, and Nature Conservancy Launch Renewable Energy “Atlas”
What do you get when Planet, Microsoft, and the Nature Conservancy walk into a bar? Probably some pretty wonky and in-the-weeds convos, but also, the potential for a productive collab. To that end, the three organizations have just lifted the wraps on the Global Renewables Watch (GRW). They describe the tool as “a first-of-its-kind living…
LeoLabs Announces Space Insurance Tool
This week, LeoLabs launched a space insurance tool in beta. The tool is geared toward underwriters, who can use the service to assess the orbital debris collision hazards in LEO. Specifically, the space insurance tool will let companies and space agencies rapidly determine collision risk; calculate risk probabilities; visualize LEO; predict future collision risk evolution over…
Crowdfunding Platform’s SpaceX “Petition” Passes $11M in Pledges
Spaced Ventures is waging a longshot bid to amass retail investors and petition SpaceX to raise a community round. In under a week, the space crowdfunding investment platform has passed $11M in pledges from users. The tally includes pledges from both unaccredited and accredited investors. Spaced Ventures’ MO is opening up space private markets to…
Pathfinder #0017, featuring Redwire’s Peter Cannito and Al Tadros
Bonjour, and welcome to another Pathfinder from Paris dispatch. We have a surprise in store for you…a twofer! That’s right, two guests for the price of one and packaged up into one standard-length Payload. Today’s guests: Redwire CEO + Chairman Peter Cannito, who is also an operating partner at AE Industrial (AEI) Redwire CTO Al…
Microsoft Launches First Product with SpaceX
Microsoft is scaling up its presence in space, in a figurative rather than literal sense. Azure, the company’s cloud computing arm, is focused on building out software tools and partnerships within the industry, rather than launching its own hardware into space. Azure Space launched in Oct. 2020. It’s apparently been quite busy since then. The…
