How has become the American space industry dependent on Spacex

The value of Spacex is about $ 400 billion, which is very important to reach space, but it was not always the strength that is today.

He founded Elon Musk Spacex in 2002. Using the money collected from the sale of PayPal, Musk and his new company developed his first missile, Falcon 1, to challenge the current offices.

“There was already a lot of emerging airlines looking to do this market. They realized that we have a monopoly provider called UNICED LAUNICLLANECE. They have merged. Boeing and Lockheed Lori Garv, a former deputy director of NASA, said the ability to launch missiles for one company, and was receiving hundreds of millions of dollars to launch satellites.

In 2003, Musk displayed Falcon 1 in the streets of Washington in the hope of attracting the attention of government agencies and contracts that they provided with millions of dollars. In 2004, Spacex succeeded in a few million dollars from the Defense Defense Projects Agency, DarPa, and the US Air Force to continue to develop their missiles.

Despite government support, the company struggled. The first three launch of Falcon 1 failed to reach orbit.

“NASA, specifically the initial commercial shipping contract, said what saved the company when it was on the verge of bankruptcy,” said Chris Coelti, president and participant at Quilety Space, a space -focused research company.

NASA granted the contract of $ 1.6 billion, known as the commercial display services to Spacex in 2008, just months after the first successful flight from Falcon 1. The contract on Spacex called for the use of his new missile, The Falcon 9, along with his dragon capsule for cargo and international satellite station for 12 missions. In 2014, Spacex won another NASA contract worth $ 2.6 billion to develop and operate vehicles for astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

Today, Spacex dominates large parts of the space market from launch to satellites. In 2024, SpaceX has set a record in 134 standard phases, more than twice the number of launch operations by the next most abundant launch provider, China Science and Technology, according to the Brycetech Science and Technology Consulting Company. These launch operations constituted 134 83 % of all spacecraft launched last year. According to the July report submitted BloombergThe value of SpaceX is 400 billion dollars.

Capsule Dragon’s Dragon’s Capsule and Falcon 9 are the basic means that NASA launches astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station. The company’s STARLINK is indispensable to provide access to the internet to remote areas as well as all allies during wartime. The company Rocket Starship for the company, although it is still in the test, is a key to the US plan to return to the moon. Spacex also builds a network of spy satellite for the American government called Starshield as part of a $ 1.8 billion contract. Even competitors including Amazon and OneWeb launched their satellites on Rockkets Spacex.

“The ecosystem of the area is changed, it is actually Spacex,” said Garv. “The low cost of reaching space is to do what we dreamed of. A full community of companies has been built all over the world that can now reach space.”

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