Re:ESA’s new Ariane 6 rocket passed a major full-scale rehea...
by jve on Friday November 24, 2023 @05:36AM
(#38402491)
> SpaceX in-house demand for something we have no clue about its financial viability or profitability
Starlink achieved cash-flow breakeven it seems: https://www.reuters.com/technology/elon-musk-says-starlink-h...
But the journalism... that statement is only in the title.
Re:ESA’s new Ariane 6 rocket passed a major full-scale rehea...
by hef19898 on Friday November 24, 2023 @07:33AM
(#38403324)
"Elon Musk (or any other person for that matter) says..." and "last quarters results show that" are not even in the same universe so.
Re:ESA’s new Ariane 6 rocket passed a major full-scale rehea...
by inemesitaffia on Friday November 24, 2023 @09:59AM
(#38404616)
Cash flow positive is simple. In a given time period your income is more than your expenses. It doesn't cover what you've spent in the past
Re:ESA’s new Ariane 6 rocket passed a major full-scale rehea...
by hef19898 on Friday November 24, 2023 @10:00AM
(#38404629)
I know. It isn't called break-even so, that is profits. And cash-flow and profits live on different axis.
Re:ESA’s new Ariane 6 rocket passed a major full-scale rehea...
by inemesitaffia on Friday November 24, 2023 @10:07AM
(#38404708)
True, but profits are limited to financial years. The real question is when they'll have made more than they've spent lifetime. For Tesla it's happened, same for Falcon 9 and Dragon.
What's questionable is starlink, starship and Falcon Heavy
Re:ESA’s new Ariane 6 rocket passed a major full-scale rehea...
by di4na on Friday November 24, 2023 @05:38AM
(#38402519)
Yeah a problem we were talking about a lot a few years back, before Starlink, was that SpaceX could not find enough market for the amount of launch they needed.
Starlink has been their solution to that but it is still an open question how well that makes money and for how long...
And we have not really seen a space market exploding behind it.
Today, it seems, a lot of the launch volume comes from Starlink, which is basically SpaceX in-house demand for something we have no clue about its financial viability or profitability. Hence, I am quite sceptic about a lot of the space launch stuff. We have quite reliable numbers for SpaceX competitors (launch costs, development...) while SpaceX is somewhat of a black box. That alone makes comparing claims from SpaceX (which might well be true, but we cannot tell either way) to verifiable numbers from others dubious at best.