Everything is Flying: How Space Tech Shapes Earth

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1:47Carol Massar:Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts, radio, news. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Tim Stenevek on Bloomberg Radio. Well, lots of news in the world of space. There was, of course, Artemis 2 last week. We've got our colleague Lauren Grush reporting this week that NASA may not have those new lunar spacesuits ready by the time the agency hopes to land humans back on the moon in 2028. That's according to a new audit. But there's some good news. It takes time. NASA also this week unveiling its next generation space observatory. That happened on Tuesday. The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope now fully assembled ahead of its planned launch as early as this fall.

2:29Carol Massar:There's a lot going on in this space. And what's funny is it was quiet for a while. You know, you go back decades and there was just this space race, but it got quiet for a while. And then the private guys got into it. And it's just fun to see so much activity once again. We're doing a deep dive on the world of space. We've got Ross Hamilton with us, chief operating officer of the Space Network. It has the mission to, quote, advance the commercial growth of the global space sector and integrate space technology across all industries. He's also the author of the new book, Everything is Flying from Ancient Skies to Deep Space, How Space Technology Shapes Life on Earth.

3:01Also on Earth with us here in the Bloomberg Interactive Brokers Studio.

3:05Carol Massar:Who doesn't ever seem to want to go into space. That's OK. That's a no. Well, yeah, we got Ed Ludlow with us. He joins us here for just a little bit more before he goes back to San Francisco because he covers all space, all things space here at Bloomberg. Welcome to both of you. Appreciate you joining us. Ross, I just want to start big picture. Ed reports all the time on the private space industry, SpaceX, the IPO, when that is going to happen, what that will mean, and the moves of these companies. Where do you think we are in this moment right now? I think we're in a very pivotal moment. You know, as you alluded to, the commercial space guys are starting to really kind of lift off now.

3:41and I think with what Artemis represents and what SpaceX are doing, I think you're going to see a big, big change. I do think that the SpaceX IPO represents a fundamental shift. Whatever investors think of the valuation of that, I think you're going to see a lot of spin out from SpaceX. Similarly, now that Artemis 2 has completed its mission, it's really about putting humans back onto Mars and of course the moon. And I think what the administrator, Jared Asikman, is saying is that NASA's back in the exploration business, which means the low Earth orbit, where all the commercial operations are, is now open even more so for commercial companies.

4:27And you're seeing that, you know, SpaceX and Rocket Lab and Amazon are all starting to put stuff into the commercial space, you know, low Earth orbit. And I think there's lots of opportunity now, given the fact that NASA is essentially acting as a customer in the low Earth orbit space.

4:46Carol Massar:It is kind of interesting at the dynamics how it's changed. I mean, you've been at the launches, you've been reporting on this space for a while. What are you seeing in terms of, we obviously talk a lot about the big companies and the big players that are out there, but there's a lot of other companies.

4:59Ed Ludlow:Yeah, it's interesting that, you know, Ross's kind of summary of Jared Isaacman at the helm of NASA, right? Like NASA has become a bit more like the project manager rather than the customer itself. And like the way that Jared Eisenman would frame it is that NASA does the science experiments, the stuff in the lab that is almost on the verge of science fiction, that has no commercial logic or even viability. And that leaves space, pardon the pun, for the private sector to come in and do the things that are achievable, the mission goals in the near term. So that has been very, very interesting. And Artemis 2 end-to-end was a great success, right?

5:41Ed Ludlow:Even if it was slightly behind schedule and many billions of dollars over budget. And so now the burden of proof is on all of those stakeholders to execute on the next phases of it. I think there's an interesting part about Artemis is it's not just NASA. There's tens and tens of countries and hundreds of companies involved in that. So it really is about collaboration. And as I recently said, that this is no longer about years before we go back to the moon. This is about months now. We've got to be thinking in months versus years, which means they have to collaborate with industry, which creates opportunity for everyone who's in that entire supply chain.

6:20Carol Massar:I want to ask you though, my dad was involved in the space race back in the 50s and 60s, working for a little company called Bendix that became Outlight Signal, that became Honeywell, but it was all about doing guidance systems. But it is amazing. And it's just fascinating to see. Like I always think about these rockets coming back and landing. He would be blown away. He's not around anymore. But we grew up with this. But there was that collaboration that you did have government. First of all, it was a government initiative. And then you brought in all these contractors, right? So what is different about that you see the collaboration that you talk about that might have been different from years past?

6:59Carol Massar:Was it just because the government was leading it versus maybe now the private sector is leading it more so? I think there's a few factors. I mean, let's not discount the involvement of SpaceX with NASA, particularly around this idea about reusable vehicles. That's driven down the cost, which makes it more accessible, which means more people can put stuff up in space. That's definitely been a big factor. But it has come in phases. You know, you talk about the 60s and early 70s, and then we didn't because the Cold War was kind of, you know, over. And then there was the 80s, you know, with the shuttle, and then we had some, unfortunately, some disasters.

7:33But I really think it did take, you know, the vision of people like Elon to kind of fire this back up again. But it's always been there. And I think one thing that's driving things now, which does drive the commercial space sector, is national security.

7:50Carol Massar:Interesting. If you think about how modern military warfare is conducted and how global logistics are conducted, much of that is through space technology now. And the interesting thing is, look at all that military development has created these spinouts for the retail and consumer sector. Not to mention future opportunities with Golden Dome, for example, and companies getting involved with that. I want to ask both of you this question. I want to start with you, Ed. Sure. But you, you know, Ross, put the money where it goes, you know, investing in some of these companies. The opportunities in the near term versus the long term.

8:23You know, a few years ago, Maureen Stanley out with this big space economy report, trillion dollars by 2040 is what we could see. And talk about mining and all these things of like, you know, landing craft on asteroids and getting raw materials and those sorts of things. That's a very different scenario than, you know, getting wireless Internet to people on airplanes quickly. you know and and there's a lot of space between those those different types of goals but that's

8:49Ed Ludlow:all included in this idea of a space economy well like here and now uh the vast majority of spacex's revenues in in the calendar year 26 will be starlink you know and it will be nearer to 20 billion dollars when last year it was you know 10 to 15 billion dollars and we're well past the point with spacex as an example where starlink is more than 50 versus launch um i am right i will not speak on ross's behalf but the point of his book while it pays due respect to history is that you know the space economy now is not just rockets and astronauts the value of data is very key even in that morgan stanley report about the trillion by 2035 or 2040 the launch part of it is so small yeah um the bigger picture right is like you know the geopolitical we're racing china to the moon that's a great impetus at a nation state level to get going but blue origins raise and debt if If SpaceX's whole original thing was to make humankind multi-planetary species, you know, Jeff Bezos and Blue's thing was like, there's a lot of valuable stuff on the moon and in asteroids.

9:49Ed Ludlow:We should go after it. You know, the world needs those kinds of resources. I mean, I definitely think the asteroid thing is long term and we can discuss whether it's practical or not. But I do think there are things you are much closer to home. So, for example, mining the moon. You're right, it is a race to the south pole of the moon. We know China are looking to do that. And why are they doing that? because there's frozen water, there's ice there. Well, how do you get the ice? Well, you need power. You need nuclear. So there's a whole supply chain of things required to do that in the shorter term.

10:20And then closer to Earth, when you think about what's happening, I was listening to the TV earlier and we were talking about AI data centres. That's going to be one of the things that's happening in space as well.

10:33Carol Massar:You think it's a given. It's just a matter of time. I think it's a matter of time. I can't tell you when. there's definitely some technological hurdles and there's probably some regulatory hurdles on that but i think for sure there's a lot of advantage to putting a lot of ai processing up in space because space is driving a lot of our lives so rather than beaming it back down and when there's lots of power available up in space um why not do it up in space so then the opportunities ross for investors you talk to these companies all the time you know what's being developed right now so it's a mixed bag so i mean like you've obviously got the big the big guys at spacex and the ipo and everyone wants to be a piece of that i actually think the interesting things on the other end of the market i think there's a lot of really fascinating deep tech companies that are coming out and our company space network we focus on the commercialization of space tech companies which means helping find capital, customers, partners, suppliers, you know, and talent.

11:33And I think the challenge for the space industry thus far has been space for space sake. And I think now that we see that the opportunity is for pharmaceuticals and agriculture and non-space industries to use space technology, that's the opportunity. But what we need to do is get the non-physicists, the non-engineers involved, really think about commercialization you know the business people the marketing people the the construction people and that's kind of part of the book was how do we expose and educate to a broader market that this is something that is happening and how do we get the young talent and people motivated and get involved in this so again that's not like a short-term play right but five to ten years this stuff is literally taking off what he means is like the corp dev team corporate

12:24Ed Ludlow:development you say corporate development emia now it's a corporate development comma intergalactic

12:29Carol Massar:gotta add a new line item but i do think about education because you know my dad was an engineer everybody you talked to tom keen i think his dad was an engineer there was an era where there were so many people studying science engineering like trying to understand this in the applications and the potential but there was also a national alignment and strategy absolutely and so you do wonder i mean i went full circle so i studied aeronautical engineering at university i was going to work for Rolls-Royce Aero Engines, and I get hired by JP Morgan. So I ended up into finance and tech. Traitor. But guess what?

12:58I'm back. But the point was, I knew enough working with these companies, the space tech companies, that they're not articulating their value proposition properly. Yeah.

13:09Ed Ludlow:I mean, this is Jared Eisenman's pitch, though, as well, right? Like, part of his portfolio as a NASA administrator is he has flown around the country since he was confirmed, trying to encourage kids, I say kids, people to go from college and work for NASA. Right. You know, that, And again, they want to be the lab, the research arm, but it's trying to get people to fall back in love with the idea again and have a career in it.

13:30Carol Massar:It's pretty cool stuff. This was fun. Thank you both so much. Ross Hamilton, Chief Operating Officer of Space Network, his new book, Everything is Flying, From Ancient Skies to Deep Space, How Space Technology Shapes Life on Earth. And of course, the wonderful Ed Ludlow, co-tech of VTech. Co-tech?

13:46Ed Ludlow:Co-host. I'll take it. I'm a techie.

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