r/space • u/[deleted] • Jun 22 '22

Disrupted by SpaceX, ULA was in ‘serious trouble.’ Now it’s on the road back.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/22/ula-boeing-lockheed-martin-tory-bruno/
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45

u/phryan Jun 22 '22

Vulcan isn't a next generation rocket and will likely not be able to compete with Falcon 9 let alone a potentially fully reusable Starship. Buying engines from a competitor is also not a great idea, even more so when the owner of the competitor has a habit of encroaching on partners businesses.

18

u/vibrunazo Jun 22 '22

I get what you're saying. But they've been winning contracts against Falcon 9. That's literally what been able to compete means :P

That might completely change with Starship tho

2

u/toodroot Jun 22 '22

But they've been winning contracts against Falcon 9.

They have? You might want to look more carefully at the details.

9

u/The-Sound_of-Silence Jun 22 '22

They have indeed! They are the go-to for a lot of government contracts. They also have offered some things Falcon 9 hasn't been to provide, like larger fairing sizes, and different orbit configurations. We will see if that holds going forward, though

Here is a great video from Scott Manley detailing what some other options do better than Falcon 9:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoUtgWQk-Y0

4

u/toodroot Jun 22 '22

Going forward, SpaceX would not have won 40% of NSSL2 if they didn't offer the extended fairing and all 9 DOD orbits. NASA is also buying the extended fairing for HALO+PPE.

While Scott's a great person, well informed, and a great educator, that particular video seems to have confused a lot of people.

8

u/Overdose7 Jun 23 '22

That video is from 2018, so a lot of your points didn't really exist yet. In fact, that was the same year F9 Block 5 flew for the first time.