Space Industry Analysis
Jan 06, 2016
The European launch consortium, which today lifts more than half of the world’s communications satellites, says the recent successful recovery of a Falcon 9 core stage is only the first step for SpaceX in reusing the already-low-cost rocket.
Jan 04, 2016
From the commercial-aircraft ramp-up and small-UAV explosion to U.S. defense budget pressures and Europe’s response to Russian aggression, 2016 will be a dynamic year for the aerospace and defense industry.
Jan 04, 2016
Tiny ADS-B for UAVs; better materials, lighter diesels; NASA seeks clean-sheet thinking on 2035 airspace; Basque partners combine additive and subtractive
Jan 01, 2016
A320neo and C Series enter service; F-35A goes operational, JAS 39E flies; emissions measures and tracking mandates for aviation; contract protests and consolidation pressures; unmanned aircraft and suborbital spaceplanes—things will come in pairs in 2016.
Dec 25, 2015
Countering UAS, beating brownout, robotic copilots, communication by laser, and building-block satellites are among advances that could make the news in 2016 and beyond.
Dec 25, 2015
SpaceX is celebrating the first successful touchdown on land of an orbital-class booster, the first step toward a potential paradigm shift in easing human access to space.
Nov 24, 2021
DART separated from its Falcon 9 second stage just less than 56 min. after launching, a milestone followed by signal acquisition by the APL mission operations center 70 min. after liftoff.
Nov 23, 2021
The eldest daughter of Alan Shepard, the first American to venture into space, will fly on the Blue Origin suborbital spacecraft named after her father, the company said on Nov. 23.
Nov 23, 2021
Lockheed Martin on Nov. 23 announced the Next Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (NGG) Block 0 program passed its system-level critical design review, keeping pace for the first launch in 2025.
Nov 23, 2021
Launch of the James Webb Space Telescope, the $11 billion, U.S.-led successor to the Hubble observatory, is being delayed at least four days to no earlier than Dec. 22 to allow time for additional analysis following a mishap during processing the telescope for launch in French Guiana.
Nov 23, 2021
DART is the first attempt to demonstrate a kinetic impact strategy for diverting an asteroid away from Earth.
Nov 23, 2021
Astra Space, a California-based startup staking a claim in the burgeoning small-satellite launch business, completed a successful flight test of its Rocket 3.1 booster on Nov. 20, a mission backed by the U.S. Space Force.
Nov 23, 2021
Voyager Space, a private equity-backed holding company of new-space upstarts such as Nanoracks, announced Nov. 22 it has acquired a majority stake in Space Micro, a satellite communications specialist for NASA and the U.S. military.
Nov 22, 2021
The mission is a bold attempt to demonstrate whether a spacecraft traveling at high velocity can slam into an asteroid with enough kinetic energy to knock it off course—an ability that could one day enable humanity to counter objects that pose an impact threat to Earth.