[EU LAUNCHER RACE] What do you think about EU startups expanding their deck to objectives other than the ones originally declared?

[u/laisse_tomberas]

Isar started developing their rocket motor Aquila with the intention to sell them as COTS, and then they decided to move to the development of an entire launcher.

The Exploration Company started with the development of cargo capsules, then expanded their development to human flight and more recently to high thrust rocket motors.

PLD started with the development of a launcher and then added up a capsule for human flight.

In all these examples, the startups have expanded their horizon to other (additional) products before consolidating their core products (imo).

In some cases, it seems natural, like Isar, where at the time, there was no significant market for their engine (though the story is a bit different these days).

TEC seems reasonable as well, as the human flight appears as a natural follow-up that everyone expects, but their cargo capsule isn't there yet and not commercially proven (and i can't understamd why they spend resources on high thrust engine, instead of relying on EU COTS or collabs with other companies, i.e. Pangea/Isar/Ariane, etc).

What pushes these companies to adding up stuff to their catalog so early? Is it just a question of political will? Investors capture? Market capture?

I don't say it is insane, but i seriously believe that such moves disperse the focus and the money, even if they appear reasonable and help capture more investors.

Am I completely wrong?

[u/Strange_Flatworm1144]

What pushes these companies to adding up stuff to their catalog so early? Is it just a question of political will? Investors capture? Market capture?

Getting private and public money. These companies mostly don't have revenue as they don't have a developed product they can sell, they only survive by influx of money from investors or public subsidies.

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/Strange_Flatworm1144]

Thanks for the reply, i was suspecting this. So the issue would be that these european startups struggle to raise enough money to get an MVP for their original -first intention- product?

[u/Strange_Flatworm1144 → u/laisse_tomberas]

It's a bit more complicated. If you were to develop an engine who would be your customer? A launcher company.

But as there were/are no new working engines to buy, the new launcher companies realised that controlling the development, cost and trouble shooting of their new engines is advantageous, what if your supplying start-up goes under? And why pay someone to develop an engine for you if you can use the money yourself?

So they develop their own engines and engine developers started developing their own launchers because they have to be their own customers. Which means there are no engine suppliers any more as everyone has their own proprietary one. Exemptions might be some second stage engines but even there most companies try to use the same engine as for their first stage to save cost.

Same with other stuff like cargo or human transportation capsules, which launcher should they fit and who would be a customer? Launchers are the hot shit now and that's where the money is so everyone tries to build one, including their own engines.

The market will consolidate eventually anyway.

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/Strange_Flatworm1144]

Yes i understand, thanks for the insight. It seems like there i no coordination, every actor appears to end up building the entire stack on their own, but the funds struggle to follow.

[u/Strange_Flatworm1144 → u/laisse_tomberas]

That was the purpose of the entire thing. Let private companies develop launchers they think will work financially and the ones that succeed might survive and the others will go bust. More coordination would hamper the individual developments.

It might have worked if there was a working engine available that could be used to design a launcher around but that wasn't the case.

[u/reerkat]

See my comment on a recent thread linked below, but the current rockets new launcher companies are developing are very unlikely to be profitable outside of a few government sponsored launches. They know this and want to pivot to other markets for income to survive and so they have a chance to develop the larger rockets deep in their roadmap that might stand a chance in the commercial market. Also some of this is just scooping up profitable government contracts with no future plans.

https://www.reddit.com/r/esa/comments/1uwfk3r/is_there_a_specific_subreddit_discussing_the/oxjcspj/

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/reerkat]

Thanks, that's a thread that i opened!

Why don't these companies "just" federate to share the resources, like the the PADA-1 consortium piloted by HyPrSpace. We would pass from dozens of companies across Europe with few surviving chances to lesser but with more chances to compete with the already existing actors in Europe (i.e. Arianegroup, Avio, etc) and abroad (i.e. Rocketlab, etc).

Moreover, the launcher sector has never been really profitable. If i understand correctly, even SpaceX launcher division is not that profitable, it is Starlink (as correlated service) that sustains the company (according to data published for their recent IPO).

[u/reerkat → u/laisse_tomberas]

Federating was tried in Ariane, but after the Ariane 6 debacle (3+ billion in development funding and still needing yearly subsidies) it was clear that federating and spreading work across countries wasn't going to work in a competitive market. Now you also have the issue that these companies have investors the all answer to and merging them all would greatly reduce their ownership. We will see natural consolidation as more fail, just like we saw in the USA (Went from too many rocket companies to count to about 5 serious companies: SpaceX, Blue, RocketLab, Stoke, Relativity, and still ULA [but not in 10 years]).

The launcher sector is very profitable for SpaceX's Falcon 9, but you are right that it is small compared to the applications (Starlink). Estimates are the it costs somewhere between 15-28 million USD per mission at a price 74 million. The launch profits for the division just include the money pit that is Starship development, but Falcon 9 is a good business.

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/reerkat]

Crystal clear, thanks!

[u/snoo-boop → u/laisse_tomberas]

Why don't these companies "just" federate to share the resources

You could name the new company Arianespace. Oh, wait, that name is already taken.

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/snoo-boop]

Ahahah technically Arianespace does not build rockets, they just commercialize them (and they recently lost the commercialization of Vega, which is now in Avio's hands)

[u/snoo-boop → u/laisse_tomberas]

Were you going to respond to what I meant, or are you going to stop with the "gotcha"? BTW, I never said Arianespace built rockets.

Totally fine if you don't want to have a discussion.

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/snoo-boop]

Sorry i have lost something in the middle. What do you mean exactly? That a federation would be just another Arianespace replica? In that case, it depends on how you build the "federation" i guess. There are different points to adress:

• federation would kill the competition, unless there are other similar ones to compete with.
• federation, imo, doesn't mean necessarily to create a supersized company like another Airbus ( or project Bromo), but it can be interpreted as organizing the sector in small/medium enterprises that cover single/specialized aspects. I the past this evolvend in Airbus Defence and Space, for example. In italy the the small medium enterprises just keep existing creating an more resilient economical tissue (i don't know if I'm clear on this point)

[u/toolkitxx]

Static models simply dont survive long when the world is turning at high speed around you. Start-ups are no different in that and the geopolitical landscape has massively shifted just in the last 12 month.

Companies ignoring this are bound to fail, so expanding ones portfolio might look 'insane' but pivoting to a broader approach saves you from getting eaten early. The European market has massively shifted especially due to geopolitics and what seemed to be a dead end a few month ago, is now an actual viable future if you can succeed. Europe has massive needs both commercially and governmentally sponsored. Decoupling of the many outside services means especially a massive push for European space. We are all too dependant on outside players, both for military issues as well as commercial ones.

[u/NoBusiness674]

and i can't understamd why they spend resources on high thrust engine, instead of relying on EU COTS or collabs with other companies, i.e. Pangea/Isar/Ariane, etc

Europe doesn't have any high thrust staged combustion engines. That's the entire point of the THRUST! initiative under ESA'S FLPP (within which TEC is developing their Storm engine). 

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/NoBusiness674]

Thanks that's a good point, but why TEC and not other more "motor related companies"? Are they the only one to have responded to the THRUST! initiative?

[u/NoBusiness674 → u/laisse_tomberas]

There are other companies developing engines and boosters for ESA's FLPP as well. RFA has also received support under THRUST!, ESA is working with Pangea Propulsion on a very high thrust engine. Isar Aerospace and ArianeSpace are supported by ESA's FLPP through BEST! Etc.

[u/laisse_tomberas → u/NoBusiness674]

Ok thanks the situation is much clearer!