Payload’s take on what you need to know about the news of the day.
‘Twas a busy time in Paris last week. The European Space Agency announced a new cohort of astronauts and announced a budget of €16.9B for the next three years. The sum falls short of the €18.5B requested by the agency, but still represents a 17% increase over the prior period. Lots of 17s last week: […]
Happy Election Day to US readers. Hope you all are already sporting your “I voted” stickers. While we won’t know results for hours (or even days), these are the close races among space committee members that we’ll be watching as results roll in (with predictions c/o FiveThirtyEight and Cook Political Report): On the other side […]
Expect new players in the spacefaring game, says Euroconsult. Analysts from the space market intelligence firm have released their third annual report on the state of space exploration. Gone are the days when only a few major powers monopolized spacefaring—instead, Euroconsult sees a future where many more nations are active participants and investors in space […]
The looming departure of national security space champions from Capitol Hill is expected to leave a vacuum as the Space Force approaches its third birthday, but experts say more junior members are waiting in the wings for their shot to drive military space policy. One of the community’s biggest losses is Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN), […]
Space Capital has released its quarterly report on investment in the space industry. In the third quarter of 2022, investors injected $3.4B into 79 individual space companies, broadly defined across infrastructure, distribution, and applications. Infrastructure It comes as no surprise that SpaceX takes the cake in capital raised over Q3 with its $1.9B Series R. […]
RAND Corporation is out with a new report on how the US’ principal adversaries—China and Russia—perceive the American space program. The overall findings are bleak, though they come as no surprise: “The Chinese and Russian native-language primary sources reviewed for this project reflect a sustained perception that US military activities related to the space domain […]
Today marks the six-month anniversary of Russia invading Ukraine. Over the last half year, space-based services have played an integral role in each step of the conflict. Today, we’re providing a partial accounting of how space-based services and hardware have altered the course of the conflict (and how the space industry has itself been changed). […]
Editor’s note: Payload space cadets Ryan Duffy (managing editor) and Mo Islam (cofounder) originally penned this essay for Not Boring, an uber-popular newsletter on tech, strategy, startups, and investing. Nearing 150,000 subscribers, Not Boring is primarily authored by Packy McCormick, with editing and research duties fulfilled by Dan McCormick and Rahul Rana. What you’re about […]
We’ve made it halfway through 2022. The year has flown by, but it’s been filled with big news and firsts for the space industry. Here’s our recap of the off-Earth goings-on during these last six months. Q1 The year started off with a bang as JWST unfolded successfully, reached its new home a million miles […]
AstroAccess, a nonprofit that promotes disability inclusion in space, partnered with the Aurelia Institute to advance astronaut diversity by doing research on zero-gravity missions. “In one sense, space is the ultimate equalizer: everyone who leaves Earth is subject to the radical experience of leaving gravity behind,” the Aurelia Institute said in a blog post. But […]
Euroconsult has put together the first edition of Space Logistic Markets, an extensive report on the growth of the in-orbit satellite services sector. The market research firm projects that these services will generate $4.4B in revenue by 2031, as the nascent technologies are proven and productized. The report identifies six markets:: Access to space Last-mile […]
BryceTech has released its 2022 Q1 report examining rocket launches and satellite deployment. Who’s leading the race? SpaceX tops the charts with 11 rockets launched and 502 spacecraft deployed. China takes silver this quarter, with eight launches and just 38 spacecraft deployed. Although Roscosmos takes bronze for launches with four, Arianespace takes third for the […]
