Space X is an American aerospace manufacturer. If this company is not familiar to you, maybe its founder is CEO Elon Musk. Declared richest man in the world by FORBES during the year 2021. Owner of multiple successful companies: Tesla, PayPal, Open AI, the Boring Company, Neuralink, SpaceX…
Today, the focus will be on Space X and specifically how it revolutionized the aerospace industry. In 2002, after a trip to Moscow, Russia, Elon Musk created Space X. He came to collect rocket components; unfortunately, he took the flight home empty-handed as the prices were too high. He decided, at that moment, he would start a company that would produce the affordable rockets (pieces) he needed. Initially, he aimed to lower costs and improve reliability to access space, reduce space transportation to enable the colonization of Mars, grow plants on Mars, and overall revive interest in space exploration.
In 2005, Space X employed less than 200 workers.
In 2008, the firm developed Fallon 1, its first orbital launch vehicle with private funding, costing over $90 million. The first three rocket launches, between 2006 and 2008, all failed, which almost ended the company. Musk’s other companies were also going bankrupt.
However, on September 28th 2008, the fourth launch try of Fallon 1 took off into the sky successfully. Making it Space X’s first successful orbital launch.
In 2012, Space X faced great success following its Fallon 9 successful launch. As a result, the private equity valuation nearly doubled to $2.4 billion. Reaching total funding of approximately $1 billion over its first decade of operation. That same year, Space X signed two launch contracts with the United State Department of Defence.
2016 marked the first successful landing on the autonomous spaceport drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean.
In 2019, Space X announced a layoff of 10% workforce in order to help finance the Starship and Starlink projects. -The Starship project aimed at building a fully reusable space vehicle with low operating costs. The spacecraft can be specialized into several variants, either for hosting cargo, crew, or landing on the Moon. As a result, Starship is involved in several projects. A real opportunity for the corporation. Starlink is a satellite internet constellation providing satellite Internet access coverage to a large part of the Earth.
In May 2020, 2 NASA astronauts launched into orbit on a Crew Dragon aircraft, featured as an image in this article, creating history as the first private company to send astronauts to the International Space Station.
Last year, in 2021, Space X agreed to provide on-ground computer and networking services from Starlink to Google Cloud Platform and Microsoft Azure. That same year was the first flight of a crewed space capsule and reused booster launch for a “national security” mission.
Finally, in 2021 launched an all-private crew into low Earth orbit. Creating once again innovation in the industry. The birth of space tourism.
Space X offers paid crewed space flights for individuals (prices average at $55 million the seat). The capsule launched Crew Dragon resilience from Florida orbited into “Low Earth Orbit” (highest into space flight available to the public) for three days before landing in the Atlantic Ocean. All four crew members received commercial astronaut training from Space X.
All this innovation shows the potential growth of the aerospatial sector.
Nonetheless, issues are being brought up: Starlink satellite almost hitting a Chinese satellite, The US agency says Elon Musk’s expansion could flood Earth’s orbit with objects, making flights and observations more difficult, Space pollution and higher risk of space debris collision…
