If SpaceX doesn't get Starship operational soon, they're going to lose their advantage to Blue Origin and probably at least one of the several Chinese rocket companies.
modeless•30m ago
Even without Starship Falcon Heavy is still competitive with New Glenn, and nobody is anywhere close to competing with Starlink (Amazon is still far behind, as is ASTS). And if Starship works SpaceX will still be in the lead for a long, long time.
IMO the only remaining unanswered question for the Starship program is the reusability of the heat shield. There's no reason to believe any other part of it can't work.
MichaelNolan•5m ago
I always had the impression that the propellant transfer was the harder question than the heat shield. They have done a transfer demo from one internal tank to another, but they still need to test from one ship to another ship.
I only casually follow the news from r/spacex, but prop transfer is what I see generate the most discussion. It’s a hard requirement for all deep space missions. Where the heat shield could be refurbished between launches.
delichon•8m ago
Musk owns ~42% and votes ~79%. I assume that this is structured so that he doesn't lose voting control, but I can't read the fine article. That valuation would add about $180B to Musk's notional net worth.
garbawarb•5m ago
Given Musk's pay package that requires getting Tesla's valuation to $8 trillion, isn't it obvious that he should absorb all of his holdings (SpaceX, X, xAI) into Tesla?
mikkupikku•36m ago
modeless•30m ago
IMO the only remaining unanswered question for the Starship program is the reusability of the heat shield. There's no reason to believe any other part of it can't work.
MichaelNolan•5m ago
I only casually follow the news from r/spacex, but prop transfer is what I see generate the most discussion. It’s a hard requirement for all deep space missions. Where the heat shield could be refurbished between launches.