Briefs: Astrium rocketplane in PopSci; RpK update

Europe's Bold Entry into Space Tourism - Popular Science - October 2007 issue
===
This AvWeek article quotes Randy Brinkley of Rocketplane Kistler as saying that they have raised $300M of the $500M needed to prevent the cutoff of COTS funding. NASA poised to ax RpK's COTS contract - Aviation Week - Sept.24.07 (Subscription required). If NASA does cancel the RpK contract, COTS program manager Alan Lindenmoyer indicates that SpaceX may get an "adjustment" of funding and that

some of the money could also go toward one or more of several (presently unfunded) alternative concepts being proposed by a number of companies. These include a cargo canister system being studied by Constellation Service International, a combined expendable launch vehicle and reusable hypersonic lifting body from PlanetSpace, a hybrid “Dream Chaser” proposal from SpaceDev, the Arctus evolved transfer vehicle from Spacehab and an air-launched, piloted vehicle and ground-launched cargo module offered by t/Space.

Another Rocketplane article here: Okla. Space Tourism Co. Still Grounded - AP/Houston Chronicle - Sept.26.07

Posted 09/26/07 | 11:21:53 by TopSpacer | Filed under: NewSpace

Comments

CSI and SpaceHab both seem to have reasonable proposals considering the time given. Not so sure about the others

Posted by bad_astra at 09/26/07 11:48:45

How is RpK's suborbital tourism plans holding up? Have they seriously hindered their ability to develop their suborbital business in their pursuit of COTS dollars?

Posted by anon at 09/26/07 14:53:46

If the corporate heads of these companies were smart they would not have all their eggs in one basket.
Especially if they already had a start in suborbital space technology.
I doubt they would be so stupid as to commit entirely to chasing COTS.

Posted by Al Parke at 09/26/07 20:18:41

It doesn't matter if RpK has $450M of the $500 Million
they need committed. They need all of it committed
in order to make the deal unlock.

There is a lot to getting money, and the RpK guys
are famous for vague optimistic statements.
They could have some fund that says
"If you get a lead investor, we will follow on those
terms for $300M" but, a lead investor stakes
reputation does the due diligence, works the
term sheets, sets valuation etc, etc.

NASA has a clock ticking, the money will
most likely get moved by the end of the
fiscal year.

Posted by anonymous at 09/26/07 20:48:27

I would love to see the development of a new launch vehicle. But the remaining COTS money should go to one of the low risk "cargo container on existing launcher" proposals.

Posted by anonymous at 09/27/07 02:02:33

"NASA has a clock ticking, the money will
most likely get moved by the end of the
fiscal year."

Yes, Griffin has said that the $175 million balance will be awarded by end of 2007 if not before Spring 2008.

Posted by John Kavanagh at 09/27/07 05:03:13

Add Comment

Note: HTML code will not work except for bare URLs (i.e. http://www...). Also, for postings older than 1 week, comments are filtered manually to prevent spam and so may not appear for a few days.
Note: Trash talking and name calling, especially in anonymous comments, won't be tolerated.