Start Date
25-4-1989 4:00 PM
Description
The total market for space transportation services until the year 2000 is $25-30 Billion. Foreign space carriers have enviably positioned themselves in a posture capable of getting the lions share of that business, in the near term. The challenge to the U S aerospace community is the development of new technology and methods resulting in lowest cost, highest reliability, timely and flexible response to mission needs. Only then can we recapture the initiative through international competitiveness.
All present and past space transportation has been government subsidized, which is to say taxpayer supported. There are indications that the taxpayer is tiring of the burden. The space access needs of science, industry and government are sufficiently well defined and the value of space operations soundly established, to permit assessment of the potential profitability of investment in space transportation services . The time has come for a viable, privatized, commercial space services industry to stand on its own feet and take a place beside railroads, trucking, airlines, mining, petrochemicals and all other elements of our industrial base. An industry serving the needs of society is not subject to the vagaries of geopolitical winds, rather it plots its own course with long range objectives and interests. Commercial space exploitation is a vital element in the achievement of national, societal and private venture goals.
Paper Session I-C - U.S. Commercial Space Enterprise - Opportunity and Challenge
The total market for space transportation services until the year 2000 is $25-30 Billion. Foreign space carriers have enviably positioned themselves in a posture capable of getting the lions share of that business, in the near term. The challenge to the U S aerospace community is the development of new technology and methods resulting in lowest cost, highest reliability, timely and flexible response to mission needs. Only then can we recapture the initiative through international competitiveness.
All present and past space transportation has been government subsidized, which is to say taxpayer supported. There are indications that the taxpayer is tiring of the burden. The space access needs of science, industry and government are sufficiently well defined and the value of space operations soundly established, to permit assessment of the potential profitability of investment in space transportation services . The time has come for a viable, privatized, commercial space services industry to stand on its own feet and take a place beside railroads, trucking, airlines, mining, petrochemicals and all other elements of our industrial base. An industry serving the needs of society is not subject to the vagaries of geopolitical winds, rather it plots its own course with long range objectives and interests. Commercial space exploitation is a vital element in the achievement of national, societal and private venture goals.
Comments
Space Enterprise Development
Session Chairman: Chick Garcia, Manager, Grumman Corporate Development, Titusville, FL
Session Organizer: Bob Mellor, Lockheed Space Operations Co., KSC, FL