Stories about the companies building a ride to space.
Canada is opening the doors to commercial launch. On Friday, Canadian Transport Minister Omar Alghabra announced that within the next three years, the country will set up the regulatory framework and licensing processes necessary to greenlight domestic launches. “For many years, Canadian satellites have launched from sites in other countries,” Alghabra said. “It’s time for […]
The Swedish Space Corporation completed the inauguration of its Esrange orbital launch facility today with a ribbon-cutting ceremony. The ceremony was attended by Swedish and European dignitaries, including the King of Sweden, Carl XVI Gustaf; President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen; and Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson. The trio concluded the short […]
Here’s our official graphs of launches by country in 2022, along with a look back at activity for the seven years prior. These visualization stands on the shoulders of a giant, Jonathan McDowell, who did great work in cataloging space activities in 2022. The increase in the US’ number of launches can primarily be attributed […]
Virgin Orbit’s historic first launch from the Spaceport Cornwall in the United Kingdom, Start Me Up, failed to reach orbit on Monday evening. Shares of Virgin Orbit ($VORB) were off by as much as 22% in pre-market trading on Tuesday morning. What happened? Virgin Orbit reported that LauncherOne had reached space, but the webcast’s mission […]
For the first orbital launch of 2023, SpaceX’s Transporter-6 mission launched 114 small satellites into orbit. The spacecraft on the manifest ranged from cubesats to hosted payloads to orbital transfer vehicles (OTVs). The Transporter satellite rideshare missions increasingly remind us of nesting dolls, as they launch space vehicles that in turn deploy even more space […]
SpaceX is seeking another round of funding. According to emails seen by CNBC, the launch juggernaut is raising $750M in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz (aka a16z), valuing the company at $137B. 2022 was a busy year of fundraising for SpaceX. Last month, Bloomberg reported that SpaceX was offering insiders the opportunity to sell […]
The first operational flight of the Vega C rocket has ended in failure, resulting in the loss of a pair of Airbus Pléiades Neo imaging satellites. What happened? The rocket lifted off at 8:47pm ET from Kourou. The flight started off well, with the first stage completing its leg of the mission and separating successfully. […]
Can you believe 2022 is nearly over? It’s been a jam-packed year for the space industry, full of groundbreaking moments in science, turbulence in the markets and world order; substantive policy developments; and historic mission firsts. We’re kicking off our year-end coverage by looking at objects closest in the rear-view mirror. Payload combed through the […]
On Friday morning, the markets woke up to quite a surprise: A PE firm was taking Maxar ($MAXR) private in a mega-deal worth $6.4B. Then, we saw a monster merger confirmed Sunday evening, with L3Harris ($LHX) agreeing to buy Aerojet Rocketdyne ($AJRD). $MAXR take-private Maxar’s board voted unanimously to enter into a definitive merger agreement […]
Arianespace successfully launched its third Ariane 5 flight of 2022 yesterday from French Guiana. The nearly 11-ton customer payload was the second heaviest lift for an Ariane 5, topped only by an Oct. 2021 launch that carried the Syracuse A4 and SES-17 into orbit. There were three primary payloads on board. All three satellites were […]
There’s about to be a new Moon mission in play. SpaceX is set to launch the HAKUTO-R mission from Cape Canaveral, beginning a small Japanese company’s long journey to softly place a lander on the lunar surface. The Falcon 9 launch for ispace scrubbed early this morning to take extra precautions before liftoff, and has […]
Space debris x South China Sea…the crossover nobody asked for. On Monday, a Philippine military commander accused China of forcibly seizing a big piece of metal—most likely space debris—that the former nation’s navy was towing through the South China Sea. The course of events, per Philippine Vice Admiral Alberto Carlos’s telling: Beijing’s take: China’s foreign […]
