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Re:Arianespace CEO: Europe won't have reusable rockets for a... by kibwen on Friday May 05, 2023 @09:11PM (#35836996)
"Figuring out how to launch stuff extremely cheaply" is not some kind of secret sauce or competitive strategy, it's literally what every rocket company is also working towards. The ability to specifically target Mars risks optimizing for a rocket that is extremely wasteful relative to what the market is willing to bear. Case in point, what companies want is not shipping material on Mars, the moon, or any deep space capability; they want satellites in Earth orbit. You don't need Starship for that, instead you need to double down on Falcon, and every dollar spent on the former is a dollar that's not spent on the latter.
Re:Arianespace CEO: Europe won't have reusable rockets for a... by lutorm on Saturday May 06, 2023 @01:45PM (#35843630)
Traditional aerospace is not -- ULA has shown zero incentive towards driving down launch costs, their interest is more in keeping prices up on their USG gravy launches.

Falcon is not fully reusable, there's a hard cost floor from the need to throw away a second stage for every launch, and there's no reasonable prospect to avoid doing so. The idea is that Starship will beat Falcon on launch costs long term. SpaceX itself is chomping at the bit getting Starlink to launch on Starship instead of Falcon, because it will be cheaper.