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SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

reuters.com

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Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#31

Post by jordanthoms »

hudibras wrote: post #4
mdorazio wrote: post #3

This is exactly how the market is supposed to work - SpaceX is delivering the same service for a lower price and now ULA is finally forced to put serious effort into competing. I'm curious what they intend to do once the reusable first stage program gets going and launch costs drop even further.

You're exactly right, except that I don't think ULA is going to have much trouble matching SpaceX's prices. They were in a monopoly situation before where they could name their own price (not really, but close enough). I could see even ULA's pricing pendulum swing all the other way: they could start bidding for contracts at a loss, using their other business sectors to prop up the space division until they drive Spac…

ULA's only business is selling launches, almost entirely to the US Government, so the subsidy would have to come from their owners - Lockheed and Boeing. I haven't seen any indication that they are at all interested in giving ULA a massive subsidy to gain market share - in fact it looks more like the opposite, they have been reluctant to invest in ULA and have been funding Vulcan development on a quarter-by-quarter basis.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#32

Post by Retric »

fma wrote: post #23
hydrogen18 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is also illegal to bid contracts below cost when the customer is the DoD.

Illegal is a very lose term...so many projects "overrun" their contract price...I don't believe that these companies that have decades of military and government contract experience cannot budget for overhead expenses and project delays. They just end up charging more later on, rather than be upfront with actual costs.

There is generally a fig leaf where the customer changes the requirements after the contract is signed. Partly because it's hard to define complex requirements ahead of time and partly because middle management always needs to leave their mark.

You wanted that to be blue ok, that's an extra 2 million.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#33

Post by hackuser »

As far as I know, ULA's track record for reliability is much better. Last I read, maybe a few months ago, SpaceX launches had failed 1 in ~19 times, and ULA's failed zero in ~85.

I wonder how the Air Force addressed this issue. Perhaps the cost of failure is less than the premium for reliability; perhaps they evaluated reliability based on something other than the track records (e.g., an engineering review); and of course it's political - McCain, Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, is reputedly a strong advocate for SpaceX.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#34

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

bane wrote: post #30
krschultz wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now that you mention it, isn't it crazy that manufacturing a single F-35 costs more than an entire satellite launch including support services?

At this point, I'm pretty sure the Stargate must be real and the crazy cost per unit for the F-35 is to hide R&D, construction and launch of a space defense fleet.

I'm thinking space arks for the select few.

Otherwise, yes.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#35

Post by SEJeff »

hudibras wrote: post #7
JoshTriplett wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I could see even ULA's pricing pendulum swing all the other way: they could start bidding for contracts at a loss, using their other business sectors to prop up the space division until they drive SpaceX out of business. That would be blatantly anticompetitive dumping, by the textbook definition.

Well, they wouldn't exactly put it that way in the press release. An alternate end-game would be ULA stringing together a few contract wins, pushing SpaceX to the brink, and then ol' Elon gets a nice offer from Boeing and Lockheed...

Elon plays the long game, and I don't think Boeing and Lockheed have any interest in going to Mars. He wouldn't sell from a moral standpoint.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#36

Post by SEJeff »

bane wrote: post #30
krschultz wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now that you mention it, isn't it crazy that manufacturing a single F-35 costs more than an entire satellite launch including support services?

At this point, I'm pretty sure the Stargate must be real and the crazy cost per unit for the F-35 is to hide R&D, construction and launch of a space defense fleet.

Prometheus!

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#37

Post by Gibbon1 »

krschultz wrote: post #21
mey wrote: post #2

The cynic in me assumes the 40% savings will just get shoveled into the F-35 furnace.

Now that you mention it, isn't it crazy that manufacturing a single F-35 costs more than an entire satellite launch including support services?

I seem to remember that in the 1950's the US tried to design unitary multi-role fighter and it failed.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#38

Post by eggy »

jordanthoms wrote: post #31
hudibras wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're exactly right, except that I don't think ULA is going to have much trouble matching SpaceX's prices. They were in a monopoly situation before where they could name their own price (not really, but close enough). I could see even ULA's pricing pendulum swing all the other way: they could start bidding for contracts at a loss, using their other business sectors to prop up the space division until they drive Spac…

ULA's only business is selling launches, almost entirely to the US Government, so the subsidy would have to come from their owners - Lockheed and Boeing. I haven't seen any indication that they are at all interested in giving ULA a massive subsidy to gain market share - in fact it looks more like the opposite, they have been reluctant to invest in ULA and have been funding Vulcan development on a quarter-by-quarter b…

And Lockheed still has to clean up the F-35 fighter mess with cost overruns, cancelled orders, spies taking terabytes of data, and retrofitting already-delivered planes. Not to mention, suspicious accounting of the amount of indirect jobs it supposedly created, and ever-increasing costs as other countries bail or lower their order numbers. It is the most expensive weapons system purchase to date.

Re: SpaceX undercut ULA rocket launch pricing by 40 percent: U.S. Air Force

#39

Post by qaq »

hackuser wrote: post #33

As far as I know, ULA's track record for reliability is much better. Last I read, maybe a few months ago, SpaceX launches had failed 1 in ~19 times, and ULA's failed zero in ~85. I wonder how the Air Force addressed this issue. Perhaps the cost of failure is less than the premium for reliability; perhaps they evaluated reliability based on something other than the track records (e.g., an engineering review); and of c…

It's very easy to address even if you assume 5.5% failure rate will remain constant and not decline Space X is still significantly cheaper.
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