Overview: New Blue

The age-old writer’s wisdom of “show, don’t tell” also applies to the space industry. Many folks in PR have heard me over the years request videos and imagery of real people and their real space hardware. Not renderings, not graphics, not animations. Real.

Last weekend we published my feature on Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp — unpacking why he took the job, what he’s focused on in the first nine months, and his goals for the company this year. One thing we didn’t really get into during that piece was the shift in how often both Limp and the company have been sharing updates about Blue’s programs.

Before Limp, I’d often go months without seeing significant updates on Blue Origin’s work until a New Shepard launch, where I’d look for short snippets on development of New Glenn, its rocket engines and more. But since Limp started, he’s taken to regularly posting updates on social media, with photos and videos of Blue Origin teams inside factories and at testing facilities, showing the hardware they’re building.

Limp, discussing his now regular rotation of site visits across the country, explained in our conversation that his engagement is part of building the trust of Blue Origin’s customers.

“I never want to be offering, building or selling something that I don't stand behind. And so that, to me, is making sure I look those customers in the eye and make those commitments. I won't always be perfect. The company won't always be perfect. But we're going to be transparent and honest about it, and we're going to earn their trust over time,” Limp said.

As a reporter, the more regular updates are a welcome change. And I appreciate Limp’s frank take on not being perfect and aiming to be transparent.?

But I’d like to see even more, publicly. Take for example Monday’s New Shepard launch attempt. It was scrubbed due to “a vehicle issue” that needed troubleshooting. Not necessarily serious — the company had said during its webcast there was a telemetry issue it was diagnosing — but, in the three days since, the company hasn’t posted an update on whether the telemetry problem was the vehicle issue that caused the scrub or if it was something else.

I’m looking forward to catching up with Limp at Blue’s next major milestone, hopefully after New Glenn launches for the first time. The Blue program I’ll be watching most closely in the next year or so is engine deliveries. At the beginning of the year, Limp didn’t think either the New Glenn team or ULA expected Blue would deliver 15 flight-ready BE-4 engines by now — but it did.

“There's a lot of teams that have come together to make this happen … we set it as a really important goal, and the team has rallied,” Limp said.

And so far BE-4 is performing brilliantly, including in this month’s second Vulcan rocket launch, despite a rather dramatic blowout by one of the solid rocket boosters.

“I think we can continue to make progress on BE-4,” Limp added. “I feel like we have a lot of upside on that engine.”

WHAT'S UP

• SpaceX may be able to attempt a Sunday launch of Starship after the FAA's review sped up: As recently as last week, the FAA said it did not expect to issue the license before “late November,” but the regulator and partner agencies involved in the process conducted assessments more quickly than anticipated. – CNBC
• NASA is ‘really looking forward’ to SpaceX’s next Starship launch, according to acting deputy associate administrator Lori Glaze. During a presentation this week, SpaceX VP of build and flight reliability Bill Gerstenmaier said the company has “a reasonable chance to go back to the tower” for an attempt at catching the rocket’s booster, after the fourth flight’s booster “landed with half a centimeter accuracy in the ocean.” – SpaceNews
• ULA's Vulcan rocket reached orbit during the Cert-2 launch despite an apparent issue with one of the Northrop Grumman-built solid rocket boosters shortly after liftoff. – Watch
• NASA had Roscosmos seal off the leaky section of the ISS, after Russia’s space agency identified four cracks and about 50 other “areas of concern” with the PrK tunnel that connects the Zvezda module to the station. The hatch is now only opened during critical operations, when NASA astronauts move to the U.S. side of the ISS in case of an emergency evacuation. NASA’s Inspector General noted in a report last month that the leak risk is now at its “most severe.” –? The Washington Post / NASA OIG
• Ground station startup Northwood passes first major milestone by connecting a prototype antenna, dubbed “Frankie,” to Planet satellites during a demonstration in remote North Dakota. Northwood cofounder and CEO Bridgit Mendler revealed the company is working on a phased array approach to ground stations, developing its Portal systems to connect to as many as 10 satellites at once. – CNBC
• The Space Coast locks down for Hurricane Milton: NASA’s Kennedy Space Center went into HURCON II, restricted to essential personnel, with an agency ride out team prepared to assess any damage from the storm. – NASA
• OneWeb and Kepler agreed to share spectrum with Starlink as part of agreements with SpaceX to launch the companies’ satellites. A law firm has met with the DOJ’s antitrust division recently to discuss where the arrangements represented SpaceX abusing its launch market control to strong-arm concessions from other satellite companies. – WSJ
• Vast reveals design for first crewed space station: Aiming to launch next year, the startup’s Haven-1 space station features a window and lab for scientific research. Vast / Vast
• Space Force to perform first X-37B spaceplane aerobraking maneuvers to enable an orbit change and dispose of service module components. – Space Force
• Starlink’s disaster relief service is free, but its hardware is not: Customers affected by Hurricane Helene, who Starlink is offering 30 days of free service, are reporting that the company requires payment of nearly $400 for terminals to use the service. – The Register
• SpaceX launches ESA’s planetary defense mission Hera in a return to flight for Falcon 9 that saw the FAA clear the company to move ahead with the launch while the investigation continues into the Crew-9 mission’s upper stage anomaly. – ESA
• Conservative think tank Heritage Foundation wants NASA to disclose employee discussions about Elon Musk, filing “scores of Freedom of Information requests” with the intent of determining of NASA civil servants “are thwarting progress for private companies like SpaceX.” – Reuters
• Spanish launch company PLD unveils plans for larger rockets and a crew capsule. PLD is currently working on its small Miura 5 rocket, with a first launch planned for late 2025, which it intends to eventually make reusable. It plans to develop a bigger vehicle called Miura Next, to deliver as much as 13,000 kilograms to low Earth orbit, as well as aims to create Miura Next Heavy and Miura Next Super Heavy rockets and a crewed capsule called Lince. – PLD Space
• Robinhood cofounder unveils space-based solar power startup: Baiju Bhatt, who previously helped lead the fintech company, announced Aetherflux, which aims “to commercialize space solar power.” Aetherflux plans to use satellites in low orbit to transmit power via infrared lasers to ground stations on Earth. – Aetherflux
• Viasat upgrading business jet in-flight Wi-Fi service: The company says it’s made a “variety of ground-breaking enhancements” for its Jet ConneX customers, including “uncapped speeds, expanded capacity and increased network prioritization.” – Viasat
• Lunar company ispace signs agreement for robotic moon demo with the London-based Asteroid Mining Corporation. – ispace
• UAE sets up national space council, called the Supreme Space Council, to shape laws and policies in the Middle Eastern nation. – The National
• Dominican Republic signs Artemis Accords, the 44th country to join the international agreement. – NASA

INDUSTRY MANEUVERS

• Satellite antenna startup ALL.SPACE raises $44 million in funding in a round led by BOKA Group and joined by AE Ventures, Seraphim Space, and Promus Ventures. – ALL.SPACE
• Impulse wins $34.5 million Space Force contract to demonstrate Tactically Responsive Space (TacRS) capabilities with two of the company’s Mira space tugs. – Impulse
• Rocket Lab announces NASA selection for Mars sample return study: The company wasn’t included in the agency’s original selection of study concepts earlier this year, but later re-evaluated. – SpaceNews
• BlackSky awarded multimillion-dollar contract for spacecraft imaging from an undisclosed customer. The exact value of the award was not disclosed as well. The contract is for Space Situational Awareness (SSA) capabilities, which uses the company’s satellites to identify and track other objects operating in space. – BlackSky
• Sierra Space awarded AFRL contract for its Ghost cargo delivery spacecraft of an undisclosed value. Under the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Global Agile Logistics (REGAL) program, Sierra will perform a yearlong study on scaling its 150 kilogram spacecraft to accommodate up to 5 to 10 metric tons of cargo as a “pre-staged supply system” that can deliver “materiel to any location on Earth within 90 minutes or less.” – Sierra Space
• Advanced awarded NASA extension of the CAPSTONE mission, after completing the original 18-month plan. The spacecraft has been operating around the moon for over 670 days. – Advanced Space
• Boeing and Virgin Galactic settle contract lawsuit over work done for the space tourism company’s carrier aircraft. – Reuters

MARKET MOVERS

• Private investors poured $1.9 billion into 50 space infrastructure companies in Q3, according to the latest report from Space Capital. “Signs of stabilization are evident” in the investment environment for those companies. More broadly, “dealmaking is already beginning to recover following an uninspiring 2022 and 2023.” – Space Capital

BOLDLY GOING

• Siddharth Hariharan named CFO at Vast, joining the space station company after previously leading Rothschild’s consumer tech investing banking, as well as more than a decade of investment banking for J.P. Morgan. – Vast

ON THE HORIZON

• Oct. 11: Blue Origin New Shepard launches NS-27 cargo mission from Texas.
• Oct. 13: SpaceX Starship launches fifth test flight from Texas.
• Oct. 13: SpaceX Crew-8 undocks and returns from the ISS.
• Oct. 14: SpaceX Falcon 9 launches Starlink satellites from Florida.
• Oct. 15: SpaceX Falcon 9 launches Starlink satellites from California.

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