Finance

[Via Satellite 04-11-2016] SpaceX’s success in launching and landing a Falcon 9 rocket Friday is elevating the company’s confidence that it will recover more boosters going forward. SpaceX is now planning a test campaign around the recovered first stage with intentions of flying it again on a commercial mission later this year. The April 8...

[Via Satellite 04-11-2016] United Launch Alliance (ULA) is delaying the Atlas 5 launch of the Mobile User Objective System 5 (MUOS 5) satellite indefinitely due to ongoing evaluation of a first stage anomaly experienced during the OA-6 mission. On March 22, ULA successfully delivered the OA-6 Cygnus spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS), but the...

[Via Satellite 04-11-2016] Russia’s Proton rocket, produced today by Khrunichev Space Center, marked its 20th year since commercial introduction Saturday. Proton entered the global commercial launch services market April 9, 1996 with the successful launch of the Astra 1F telecommunications satellite on a Proton K. Salyut Design Bureau, designer of the Proton launch vehicle, and...

[Via Satellite 04-08-2016] The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is progressing with the Experimental Spaceplane (XS-1), shifting the program into Phase 2. The XS-1 program seeks to design and fabricate an unmanned, reusable spaceplane that would demonstrate the potential for low-cost and “aircraft-like” high-ops-tempo space flight. According to DARPA, the program could enable...

[Via Satellite 04-06-2016] Earth observation company Terra Bella, previously known as Skybox Imaging, wants to have 21 satellites in orbit by the end of next year. The Google company has two satellites in orbit today: SkySat A, which launched on a Dnepr in 2013, and SkySat B, which orbited on a Soyuz in 2014. The...

[Via Satellite 04-04-2016] Blue Origin completed the third successful flight of the company’s New Shepard suborbital launch vehicle on April 2, reaching an apogee of 339,178 feet or 103 kilometers. During the test, Blue Origin restarted the engine for the propulsive landing only 3,600 feet above the ground, requiring a quick start and ramp up...

[Via Satellite 03-25-2016] United Launch Alliance (ULA) successfully completed the Preliminary Design Review (PDR) for the Vulcan Centaur launch vehicle with dual Blue Origin BE-4 engines. The PDR confirms that the design meets the requirements for handling a diverse set of missions for commercial and government customers. The ULA team plans to build upon this...

[Via Satellite 03-23-2016] Zero2infinity, a high altitude balloon company based in Spain, is making progress on the development of a launch vehicle that uses the combination of a balloon and a rocket to deliver small satellites to Low Earth Orbit (LEO). Called Bloostar, the vehicle’s baseline design aims at carrying 75-kilogram payloads to a 600-kilometer...

[Via Satellite 03-23-2016] Following an extensive test program, Rocket Lab has qualified its Rutherford engine for flight aboard the Electron rocket. Rocket Lab created the 5,000lbf Rutherford engine specifically for the company’s Electron small satellite launch vehicle, which is capable of delivering a 150kg payload to a 500km sun-synchronous orbit. The company tested the engine...

[Via Satellite 03-23-2016] Orbital ATK completed the company’s second mission with United Launch Alliance (ULA) on March 22, launching its Cygnus spacecraft atop an Atlas 5 rocket. The company used ULA’s Atlas 5 in lieu of its own Antares launch vehicle, which the company is preparing to launch with the RD-191 instead of the AJ-26...