SpaceX update

[kenliles]

On the fence about posting this, but given Tesla majority owner and CEO spends half his time there, I thought a quich update prior to waiting Tesla news might be worh a post as a small piece of investment consideration.

As a former Aerospace engineer (and strong TSLA investor), I follow SpaceX VERY closely, so I thought I would post this update for your TSLA investment consideration.

SpaceX just succesfully launched a geo synchronous (high orbit most difficult satellite delivery) launch of their new rocket at a cost that shakes the very core of government supported (foreign and domestic) competitive launches. This particular launch has a special signifance, hence my post. It completes 3 succesful launches, 2 to geo synchronous, that completes the launch requirement for SpaceX to be the first private co. to be approved to bid for government (military, NSA, etc) launches for government satellites. A MAJOR milestone for SpaceX. The approval should now be largely procedural. Given the cost savings, this IMO essentially secures SpaceX for a long prosperous future. I'm hoping this allows Elon to bias his balance to Tesla now for an important 2014-15.

SpaceX | Launch Central

(The previous link is latest webcast which will not be applicable indefinitely)

 

[Lessmog]

Thanks, I had forgotten about the important implication of this launch for "graduating" into the select class of competition for US missions in the future.

I watched the webcast live, but it seems to be gone already. Uneventful, as it should be

 

[TSLAopt]

On the fence about posting this, but given Tesla majority owner and CEO spends half his time there, I thought a quich update prior to waiting Tesla news might be worh a post as a small piece of investment consideration.

As a former Aerospace engineer (and strong TSLA investor), I follow SpaceX VERY closely, so I thought I would post this update for your TSLA investment consideration.

SpaceX just succesfully launched a geo synchronous (high orbit most difficult satellite delivery) launch of their new rocket at a cost that shakes the very core of government supported (foreign and domestic) competitive launches. This particular launch has a special signifance, hence my post. It completes 3 succesful launches, 2 to geo synchronous, that completes the launch requirement for SpaceX to be the first private co. to be approved to bid for government (military, NSA, etc) launches for government satellites. A MAJOR milestone for SpaceX. The approval should now be largely procedural. Given the cost savings, this IMO essentially secures SpaceX for a long prosperous future. I'm hoping this allows Elon to bias his balance to Tesla now for an important 2014-15.

SpaceX | Launch Central

(The previous link is latest webcast which will not be applicable indefinitely)

i agree that its significant for Tesla for what you mention (Elon can exhale a bit from SX and focus more attention on T in the near future). Also I remember Elon hinting about possibly creating a holding company of some sort for both SX and T and if he does I'm sure there are creative ways to use some of the fundings into SX for expanding T and then late in the future vice versa. Should be interesting...

 

[Mario Kadastik]

i agree that its significant for Tesla for what you mention (Elon can exhale a bit from SX and focus more attention on T in the near future). Also I remember Elon hinting about possibly creating a holding company of some sort for both SX and T and if he does I'm sure there are creative ways to use some of the fundings into SX for expanding T and then late in the future vice versa. Should be interesting...

Elon tweeted the rough cut launch video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-np8yPS8JQQ

Anyway what I wanted to say is that if the holding company is created and it trades openly, then it would attract a shitload of money because there are a lot of people who'd want to invest in SpaceX, but can't If it's just a holding company where Elon just gives his shares to this holding company and owns 100% of it, then it's for some interesting bookkeeping ideas indeed, but not much else.

 

[uselesslogin]

They also have 15 launches on the manifest this year which is more than they have ever launched in their entire existence. That being said I suppose that the new Falcon rocket having 3 successful flights does allow some level of exhaling.

 

[Bgarret]

I just toured Kennedy space center with my kids over the break and the prevalence of SpaceX vans and personnel was impressive. Our bus driver mentioned that PAD A - the pad that was used for all the moon landings, was likely to go to Space X. He mentioned the 3 launch requirement and also that Space X is working on a 25 engine rocket to work to take over delivering astronauts to the international space station - in addition to the contract they currently have for cargo. The guide mentioned Boeing once and Space X about a dozen times. From the articles I've read (I would be interested in what you've heard Kenliles) they are undercutting Boeing and Northrup by 2-4 times. Please sign me up for the IPO...I almost changed my vacation around so I could stick around for the Jan 5th launch.

To infinity.....

 

[NigelM]

Just FYI, we a whole sub-forum covering SpaceX....moving this thread over there.....

 

[JRod0802]

They also have 15 launches on the manifest this year which is more than they have ever launched in their entire existence. That being said I suppose that the new Falcon rocket having 3 successful flights does allow some level of exhaling.

Good point. Here's the history of SpaceX launches by year:

2008 - 1 launch
2009 - 1 launch
2010 - 2 launches
2011 - 0 launches
2012 - 2 launches
2013 - 3 launches
2014 - ? launches (1 so far)

Here's a thread dedicated to making an educated guess as to how many launches will actually occur in 2014:
Number of SpaceX orbital flights in 2014

 

[kenliles]

I just toured Kennedy space center with my kids over the break and the prevalence of SpaceX vans and personnel was impressive. Our bus driver mentioned that PAD A - the pad that was used for all the moon landings, was likely to go to Space X. He mentioned the 3 launch requirement and also that Space X is working on a 25 engine rocket to work to take over delivering astronauts to the international space station - in addition to the contract they currently have for cargo. The guide mentioned Boeing once and Space X about a dozen times. From the articles I've read (I would be interested in what you've heard Kenliles) they are undercutting Boeing and Northrup by 2-4 times. Please sign me up for the IPO...I almost changed my vacation around so I could stick around for the Jan 5th launch.

To infinity.....

and beyond--

yeah that's a great tour. We took it years ago with the kids as well.
Pad A has now officially been awarded to SpaceX - SpaceX wins NASAs nod to take over historic Launch Pad 39A - NBC News.com
SpaceX pricing undercuts current European and other launch services by 3-4 to 1. (SpaceX $57M per launch vs about $200M - SpaceX Competition Has Arianespace Looking at New Pricing at Parabolic Arc ). And that gap will be significantly expanded if and when they get reusable working- that $57M might drop another order of magnitude); I haven't seen any official pricing from the Boeing and Northrop, but yes those who claim to have a bead on it estimate about a 2 to 1 undercut and that will be much more again when reusable grasshopper is operational in a couple of years

Mario- I believe the Holding company is on Hold (punn intended). Elon mentioned that he didn't want SpaceX under a quarterly profit mission- that would not be congruent with his mission for SpaceX. I think he added a caveat about having substantial clear path of profitable missions he may revisit- (I'm totally paraphrasing from memory here- but that was the flavor of it)

 

[callmesam]

and beyond--

yeah that's a great tour. We took it years ago with the kids as well.
Pad A has now officially been awarded to SpaceX - SpaceX wins NASAs nod to take over historic Launch Pad 39A - NBC News.com
SpaceX pricing undercuts current European and other launch services by 3-4 to 1. (SpaceX $57M per launch vs about $200M - SpaceX Competition Has Arianespace Looking at New Pricing at Parabolic Arc ). And that gap will be significantly expanded if and when they get reusable working- that $57M might drop another order of magnitude); I haven't seen any official pricing from the Boeing and Northrop, but yes those who claim to have a bead on it estimate about a 2 to 1 undercut and that will be much more again when reusable grasshopper is operational in a couple of years

Mario- I believe the Holding company is on Hold (punn intended). Elon mentioned that he didn't want SpaceX under a quarterly profit mission- that would not be congruent with his mission for SpaceX. I think he added a caveat about having substantial clear path of profitable missions he may revisit- (I'm totally paraphrasing from memory here- but that was the flavor of it)

I recall the same discussion. Since the ultimate goal is mars, then chasing the next quarter is incompatible. But it may be self-funding now with NASA, private and potentially military launches for low cost. The skys are going to get pretty crowded.

 

[chickensevil]

Here's a thread dedicated to making an educated guess as to how many launches will actually occur in 2014:
Number of SpaceX orbital flights in 2014

Here is their current launch roster for 2014 and beyond based on current planned test launches in the company as well as already contracted launches (for example the iridium network launches are in here for 2015 - 2017 and the NASA cargo contract is all in here.)

Re: Holding Company

I doubt this would be public any time soon. It would be as suggested a way to shift money from one to the other. I could see SpaceX being highly profitable short term since they are killing their competition in every way possible and going to suck up any new contracts out there until they just can't fit it into their timings. At this point they could charge a premium to someone to generously "give them a spot" and still undercut their competition. Anyway, long term with moon/mars missions planned, there is going to be a lot of "losses" along the way for the company, and this is why he would never make this company public. People don't like completely speculative and unknown ROI. What is the ROI on a trip to mars? To say you did it? some hypothetical advancement in science and understanding? There is no money maker here in that sense... you are not producing a "product" to sell... at least not until really long term when some 3rd party would want to rent them as a transportation company a la Futurama's Planetary Express.

 

[rolosrevenge]

I recall the same discussion. Since the ultimate goal is mars, then chasing the next quarter is incompatible. But it may be self-funding now with NASA, private and potentially military launches for low cost. The skys are going to get pretty crowded.

Well Mars One is planning on using Space X for their transport so the ultimate goal is only 10 years away hopefully.

 

[Bonken]

re holding company: how awesome would that be? a real Stark Industries - Musk Industries. Space X, Tesla, Solar City, Hyperloop all under one roof sharing assets, capital, engineers etc. Eventually theyd create the electric jet that Elon wants to do as well as all the other crazy ideas he got. Were talking world domination and the world largest company by far... Cant wait for the Musk Tower!!

 

[Bgarret]

re holding company: how awesome would that be? a real Stark Industries - Musk Industries. Space X, Tesla, Solar City, Hyperloop all under one roof sharing assets, capital, engineers etc. Eventually theyd create the electric jet that Elon wants to do as well as all the other crazy ideas he got. Were talking world domination and the world largest company by far... Cant wait for the Musk Tower!!

Don't forget that cool suit....as far as the tour, it's even better with the Shuttle Atlantis facility...and I would highly recommend the lunch with the astronaut. We had Sam Gemar present to us and he was awesome. Here's to driving our Teslas on Mars in 30.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

i agree that its significant for Tesla for what you mention (Elon can exhale a bit from SX and focus more attention on T in the near future). Also I remember Elon hinting about possibly creating a holding company of some sort for both SX and T and if he does I'm sure there are creative ways to use some of the fundings into SX for expanding T and then late in the future vice versa. Should be interesting...

I'm betting reusability is the big one for him. Stage 1 woukd be enough for for total dominance and accelerated development.

 

[TSLAopt]

Yeah, I don't think he'd do a SpaceX IPO for a long long time. However, if he does one i hope he uses the Dutch Auction method for the IPO (like,what Google did).

 

[Grendal]

Yeah, I don't think he'd do a SpaceX IPO for a long long time. However, if he does one i hope he uses the Dutch Auction method for the IPO (like,what Google did).

Elon has said he doesn't see a SpaceX IPO happening anytime soon. I would expect that it will never happen. Why? Because SpaceX makes plenty of money. More than is needed to maintain operations. An IPO is about getting a large influx of cash. The other reason is that Elon wants to go to Mars. He may not get funding to do that and if you are publically owned you have to get the okay from investors for such a non-profit endeavor. What if they choose not to back you? I'm pretty sure that would be the reasoning.

 

[ecarfan]

Well Mars One is planning on using Space X for their transport so the ultimate goal is only 10 years away hopefully.

I wonder where Mars one is going to get the money to pay Space X. I support their goal but don't see a funding source.

 

[chickensevil]

I wonder where Mars one is going to get the money to pay Space X. I support their goal but don't see a funding source.

To this I think they are really hoping that broadcasting will pay for a lot of the money with Mars One. The even list on their website a breakout of the world Olympics and how much revenue that pulls in each year (or rather 4 years). The last cycle had $8Bn... so about $2Bn a year (summer and winter included). They have listed the first trip costs to be at $6Bn to get everything there up to delivering the first 4 people. And every subsequent trip of 4 (including all the extra supplies required) at $4Bn. So it is reasonable to see a broadcast revenue stream that would give pay out to fund this. Think how much people pay for advertising in the Super Bowl... and how much someone would pay for advertising on a broadcast of the first manned mission to mars launch day. You are talking an estimated 4Bn viewers all watching this rocket take off... that is some serious advertising exposure.

 

[claytorj]

SpaceX just landed a Japanese satellite launch for 2015. I get the feeling the ball may be rolling now and we may see SpaceX's manifest growing even more in the coming months.

http://www.parabolicarc.com/2014/01/10/spacex-awarded-japanese-comsat-launch-contract/