JRP3
Hyperactive Member
Gali excited about SpaceX. Nothing groundbreaking, but he may have found a way to invest, though he can't yet talk about it.
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Interesting: https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz/status/1288101843336396802?s=21
And Elon’s reply: sum > parts
And Elon’s reply: sum > parts
Xepa777
Member
That's what I'm saying. The capabilities Starship unlocks is crazy.
Imagine traveling to space for $20,000. That market is...unbelievable. And it's a 100% SpaceX monopoly (Virgin Galactic CANNOT compete with that). And what that will do for economics of Starlink...no one can compete. If we think Tesla is unstoppable because it has 30-40% more range on its cars and a smoother software experience, imagine SpaceX.
What SpaceX doing isn't even fathomable.
As we can see from SN5 that dream is far away still. Mass manufacturing of Starship probably won't be really good until back-half of 2020s. But the 2030 - 2040 timeframe? SpaceX is going to own that decade the way Tesla is going to down 2020 - 2030. It's going to be a freaking massacre.
Imagine traveling to space for $20,000. That market is...unbelievable. And it's a 100% SpaceX monopoly (Virgin Galactic CANNOT compete with that). And what that will do for economics of Starlink...no one can compete. If we think Tesla is unstoppable because it has 30-40% more range on its cars and a smoother software experience, imagine SpaceX.
What SpaceX doing isn't even fathomable.
As we can see from SN5 that dream is far away still. Mass manufacturing of Starship probably won't be really good until back-half of 2020s. But the 2030 - 2040 timeframe? SpaceX is going to own that decade the way Tesla is going to down 2020 - 2030. It's going to be a freaking massacre.
I know I sound like a broken record, but contrary to what MS clients represent [according to that tweet], lower launch costs is NOT going to be a major enabler for space mission for a long time, and thus there's not a corollary massive growth opportunity there for launcher services. Lower launch costs represents a financial opportunity to a space mission for sure, but low launch costs are definitely nowhere near a primary mission enabler; Nobody's pinning their business model to Starship (not even SpaceX) and nobody will get even close to considering doing so until Starship is reliably operational AND the program has enough infrastructure demand to warrant a Starlink-like approach to a mega constellation. Everything else is quantities too small to significantly leverage technology and production concepts that are commonplace at SpaceX, and as such capex isn't going to decrease significantly for any of these types of missions. For years to come we're really just talking evolutionary improvements.
It also must be noted that the missions most likely to check the above boxes for needing a ton of Starship-esque lift will be direct FSS competitors with Starlink, so SpaceX will have a bit of Peter/Paul going on there...
Ultimately Starship's best growth opportunity is in human travel, since that's basically an untapped market, but we're also a long way away from that....
It also must be noted that the missions most likely to check the above boxes for needing a ton of Starship-esque lift will be direct FSS competitors with Starlink, so SpaceX will have a bit of Peter/Paul going on there...
Ultimately Starship's best growth opportunity is in human travel, since that's basically an untapped market, but we're also a long way away from that....
Shotwell and Elon aren't that dumb. They will be getting their very capable sales team selling the massive new possibilities that Starship enables well before Starship is ready. The military will buy slots. Truly huge space telescopes will be made. And if they aren't, SpaceX will build it themselves.
Afterall, what was Starlink? You think it is a nice side business for SpaceX? Elon was worried about terrestrial bandwidth? That wasn't why SpaceX built it. They conceived and built Starlink because they knew that they were going to hit a wall with the size of the launch market. It just wasn't big enough to generate enough profit to plow into Starship development. So they created their own huge new launch market. 5,000 satellites, no 10,000, no, we need 30,000 fricken satellites to fund Starship development!
Do you remember the very first BFR design Elon unveiled? Then about a year later, he unveiled an updated design, but he was most excited about the fact that "I think we've figured out how to finance its development". AFAIK, he never explained what he meant, and the press was too stupid to ask him, but I'm pretty sure he was referring to Starlink.
So Starship won't be lacking for things to haul into space. SpaceX will make sure of that.
(Please forgive and correct me if necessary with my following statements as I am new on my research into SpaceX) What I see and kinda love is how Starlink funds Spaceship development which in turn enables Starlink to launch their satellites even more cheaply using Spaceship which in turns generates more capital to improve Spaceship and so on. This is a really nice positive feedback loop until Starlink has enough satellites which probably lines up really nicely for Spaceship to pivot to its next major business of point to point earth travel. (I had to edit so many mistakes. Reminder to self: caffeine first then post not other way around.)
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Please detail the "massive new possibilities" enabled by Starship.
--It is not the government, defense or otherwise. Obviously there are opportunities; none of them will me "massive", and this will not change until the process by which a large government funds projects is completely reinvented. Defund the congress, to turn a phrase...
--It is not science. There's no money in science. As such, while some big things will be certainly built, none will be built in a quantity requiring a "massive" number of Starship launches.
--It is not earth observation. It is VERY impractical to build an accurate, high fidelity observation instrument in a volume that will necessitate "massive" use of Starship, and there's not a strong demand to hack of a gazillion smaller, lower fidelity observation instruments (weather RO, Planet-like shitty resolution for visible and near visible light, etc.)
--It is not broadcast FSS. That market is best served by GEO satellites which are deployed in un-"massive" quantities.
--Its unlikely to be two-way FSS. Any such mission actually requiring "massive" starship capability will explicitly reduce Starlink revenue.
--It is unlikely to be IOT. There's growth here for sure, but IOT is served with less than "massive" satellite size/quantity, thus not a "massive" launch demand.
--It is unlikely to be MSS. There's also growth here for sure (look at the bar set by Iridium, Inmarsat, etc) but its hard to imagine there being a ton of financial opportunity in this one, so the constellations are going to be much more modest than Starlink and thus will not. There are very few people willing to pay anything for off grid connectivity.
Again, all above can benefit from Starship to reduce mission cost. None represent "massive new possibilities" for Starship bur rather a handful of launches that might require Starship and then a number missions that will be happy to save a buck by using Starship. A first order ceiling for what you're calling "massive" is the current progression/projection of total annual launched mass [that doesn't include Starlink]. Again, starship isn't going to move that projection much if at all.
So that pretty much just leaves human travel:
--Space tourism is a bit of a dud, see: New Shepard, Virgin Galactic. There's an opportunity for sure; "massive" it is not.
--Really about the only "massive" opportunity is rapid PTP earth travel--a completely new industry. Of course, given regulatory, safety, financial, and cultural acceptance, we're at least 20-30 years away from that becoming anything close to "massive".
Easy. A way to pay for Mars.
1. Elon wants to go to Mars
2. Mars is expensive
3. A non-zero Mars expense is the cost of mass
4. A major technical roadblock to mars is limited launch capability
5. A bigger rocket is imperative for #4 and is an upper for #3
6. A bigger rocket is expensive to develop
7. There was disruptive opportunity in two-way FSS
8. A natural solution was to develop the disruptive FSS constellation to generate revenue to pay for the Mars mission, with the benefit that the FSS constellation would create internal demand of a bigger rocket and thus accelerate its development.
Your assumption about time frame is what I would like to hear other opinions on. SpaceX has stated they aim to do PTP earth travel the latter half of this decade. And they obviously have way more info about their capabilities than any of us. But then again, there is accounting for Elon time ...
As excited as I am personally about the prospect of riding a Starship halfway around the world someday, I think the real world obstacles to that form of travel are too formidable to make it a reality during this decade. Starship PTP is another example of Elon getting ahead of himself; a technologically sound concept that will prove incredibly difficult to implement and could potentially be more of a distraction for SpaceX than a benefit that contributes to the mission of the company, making human life multi-planetary.
There's going to be a <ahem> massive uphill battle to square regulatory/safety approval to transport paying customers strapped to the top of a rocket. SpaceX will have to champion standing up an entirely new set of regulatory offices, procedures, etc--basically, take the airline industry, pump it full of steroids, and build that. For more detailed analysis we can look at the airline industry and their acceptance of (and limitations for) automated operation, and also the various milestones that the autonomous automobile industry has to achieve.
Even if we assume a pie-in-the-sky $1M cost/trip, with ~100 PAX that's ~$10k/PAX, which is more or less today's international first class. There's still a TON of work to do on that price point if "massive" is going to be part of the vernacular.
Last, the cultural transformation/acceptance of PAX will take time, and probably won't start until the above two are solved...at least the first one (= flights actually become commonplace enough to build meaningful statistics).
Yes, but some would say that making routine Mars missions is a tad more complicated than earth to earth travel. If you had to bet which one would occur on a routine basis in the 2020's, why wouldn't you pick earth to earth rather than Mars?
Anyways, we all should step away from the koolaid a bit. It is nice that Elon has massive goals such as setting up a self sustaining city on Mars, but just because he has that goal, doesn't mean it is possible to do and he won't fail. While we all give him kudos for building a car manufacturing company and a rocket company from scratch, both of those existed before Elon took them on. He has massively improved both, of course, from what was there before, but success was definitely on the menu. Martian colony? Could very well be impossible in our lifetimes.
I pick Mars as being much more likely to be accomplished by SpaceX in this decade than Starship PTP because there are few regulatory hurdles in the way, the technological challenges are huge but they are scientific and not due to human emotions or conventional thinking, there is no existing government on Mars so it’s a clean slate, and that Mars is Elon’s primary goal. He thinks of it as his life’s work.
Starship PTP is a cool fun idea but it’s a sideline for SpaceX. Tesla got temporarily sidelined by the Model X (which is not in Elon’s Secret Master Plan) and I think Elon learned a lesson from that. FOCUS.
mikes_fsd
Banned
At $10k/PAX to go to space is still < 1 / 20th of what anyone else is "offering"... in my book that is already "massive".
I'd encourage you to pay a little more attention to context if you're going to actually respond.
The statement you quoted of mine was clearly in reference to earth PTP transport.
Yes, in which case you also get to go into space for longer than Virgin (6 minutes of weightlessness).
Well no, you could do a non coasting (burn burn) or high areo drag profile, but that seems inefficient.So weightlessness is now a criteria in PTP transport?
adiggs
Well-Known Member
So weightlessness is now a criteria in PTP transport?
Not a criteria, but a really nice augmentation of the idea. If I can go west coast US to Australia (*) in 30 minutes with 5 or 10 minutes of weightlessness (or close) along the way, then I can easily imagine people that make that trip for the experience (weightlessness, view) along the way over a particular desire to see the destination.
Just buy a round trip ticket and be home an hour or 3 after you leave, with 2 bouts of weightlessness along the way (and presumably a cabin that would include personal views of the earth from space).
I'd buy that ticket for $20-30k (each way) for the experience in a heartbeat. More isn't off the table (though I will encounter a retirement funding constraint at some price). I might even leave the spaceport while I'm in Australia and see the sights!
(*) Obviously the start and end points don't really matter, unless a particular pair provides a particularly long duration coast / weightless phase.
As would I. Way cheaper than what BO and Virgin Galactic will be offering. However, the Starship PTP trip may not allow passengers to unbuckle and float around due to the challenges of managing such a large number of people in microgravity and the fact that the main purpose of the trip is to get from A to B as quickly as possible.
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