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Rocketlab acquires Iridium

investors.rocketlabcorp.com

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Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#201

Post by hgoel »

lstodd wrote: post #196
Sanzig wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay buddy, that was a Gish gallop if I've ever seen one. The risk is real. The math isn't complicated, you could stand up a basic debris simulation in a few hours with numpy from first principles. And we also know it's real because it's actually happened multiple times now: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_collision This is a real thing that satellite operators worry about all the time . Conjunction analysis…

No, it is not real as in threatening anything in particular. Some old crap got shot up. Who cares, we can launch 10x or 100x.

That attitude is how you start building up more and more debris until an orbit is basically unusable.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#202

Post by charcircuit »

mschuster91 wrote: post #115
iamtheworstdev wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh. People already trying to find ways to gate keep space by raising the financial barrier to entry before we've even been able to capitalize on cheap space flights. I'm sure SpaceX and others will be against this until suddenly, they're not, when they realize they're one of the few that can even afford to pay it. Like when Amazon finally had warehouses in all fifty states and suddenly quit campaigning against onlin…

> People already trying to find ways to gate keep space by raising the financial barrier to entry before we've even been able to capitalize on cheap space flights. Space flight is a typical "tragedy of the commons" scenario. Like radio waves (especially on HF), space orbits are a finite resource... and not just problematic for other satellites, because ground-based space observation gets more and more impeded by sate…

It may be finite, but satellites are tiny and the earth is huge. We barely cover the Earth's surface where we don't even have to deal with launching it into space.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#203

Post by skissane »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #177
skissane wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alternative take: if a SPCX-TSLA merger proposal is publicly announced, that will create market enthusiasm (quite possibly irrational) about “unlocking synergies” which will temporarily pump both stocks, thereby making Musk (and all the other insiders) richer, even if only temporarily. Plus, the two firms already cooperate heavily, and Musk wants them to cooperate more, but being two separate public companies adds a…

I have a really dumb prediction that at some point he’ll name one of the public companies X, presumably either SpaceX or a merged company. The dumbest people in the world would say he’s turned Twitter into a $2tn company and he’d find that hilarious.

It would be hilarious if Musk merged SpaceX and Tesla, and then decided to call the result Twitter

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#204

Post by hgoel »

panick21_ wrote: post #37
espadrine wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iridum gains 23 launches per year with 100% success rate in the past 12 months, a satellite manufacturing pipeline with 6 satellites produced and launched, and a cost-to-orbit of $25K/kg operational (with an in-development design targetting $4K/kg). They are late compared to SpaceX, to be sure: 150 launches per year, 2400 satellites manufactured per year, $3K/kg operational with F9, target $200/kg in development with…

You act as if 'launch' is a thing. All Rocket Lab launches ever combined don't even fill a single SpaceX rocket. Those are not the same thing. Lets see their reliability when they have a bigger rocket and if they can land reliably. Because their rocket will be quite expensive to build.

We know from the graveyard of companies that reached orbit with their small rockets and ran out of funding before they got to be reliable, that reliably flying even a small rocket is pretty good.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#205

Post by ericmay »

athrowaway3z wrote: post #197
ericmay wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how did the Dutch collect the toll and who received the tax benefits for it? I’m interested in understanding your comparison here and how it would be applicable to space and how you envision it working based on your comparison.

You wish to take up a specific space, and with the right to use it come obligations. There was no tax or toll to consider. People naturally self-assembled under the idea that if you benefited, then you had to contribute. The calculation was: how much land did you have, how valuable was it, how much benefit you'd get from some waterworks (it wasnt just dikes but also rerouting rivers etc). Obligations were denominated…

Ok but that's not what I asked... You're just saying "we should have some system that benefits everyone". Ok sure that sounds nice, but you compared it to a specific framework with an off-hand "we've solved this so long ago" type of comment. Surely if it's so simple and straightforward and the Dutch "already figured it out" you'd have at least some idea of a proposal or implementation details.

How will the toll be collected? Who will collect it? How will it be fairly distributed?

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#206

Post by labcomputer »

lxgr wrote: post #102
Scoundreller wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much of the power-efficiency is due to being much slower. Don’t need to blast and beam-steer if you can deal with poor SNR by taking your time to differentiate the 0s and 1s? Which is more power efficient per megabyte? (But I get it: sometimes a few bits is all you need)

All of it. You can't really get around physics. Iridium has historically targeted low-power, omnidirectional terminals (antennas can be larger at lower frequencies without requiring steering than at higher frequencies). They recently had some forays into steered, high-bandwidth antennas with their Certus line and their second-generation satellites that now allow native packet switching (the first gen was circuit-swit…

> (antennas can be larger at lower frequencies without requiring steering than at higher frequencies).

No.

1. Iridium uses frequencies fairly close to GPS (~1.6GHz).

2. Iridium uses cylindrically-polarized transmissions (like GPS), which enable compact omnidirectional helical antennas

> They recently had some forays into steered, high-bandwidth antennas with their Certus line and their second-generation satellites that now allow native packet switching (the first gen was circuit-switched at 2.4 kbps only), but that brings you into the bandwidth-limited regime,

This is AI slop?

No, the point of using an electrically-steered beam antenna is that it improves SNR, so that you are not bandwidth limited.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#207

Post by ElProlactin »

everfrustrated wrote: post #139
ElProlactin wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Neutron is almost complete... I've made hundreds of thousands of dollars from my early investments in RKLB but this isn't true if by "complete" you mean they have a proven launch vehicle. The company is now targeting late 2026 for Neutron's inaugural flight. Neutron was announced in 2021. There were hopes for a 2024 first flight. Then it was mid-to-late 2025. Now it's Q4 2026 after a failure related to the stage 1…

Yes tho I'd argue that Rocket Lab has the finances to easily weather a few more years of Neutron set back if that ends up happening (fingers crossed it doesn't happen). They aren't going bust anytime soon. So I don't see the downside as being zero.

> Yes tho I'd argue that Rocket Lab has the finances to easily weather a few more years of Neutron set back...

The company won't go bankrupt if Neutron is delayed but I disagree with the "easily" part and Iridium complicates the picture. It throws off a lot of cash but comes with a $3.6 billion bridge loan that RKLB will need to deal with in the next year. If they term it out with debt, the leverage goes way up. If they term it out with equity, there's real dilution risk, especially in the scenario where the market prices in Neutron delays (because the stock almost certainly will be lower).

The reality is that Neutron is critical to the RKLB story, and that story is what supports the current valuation. Even after the recent decline from the ~$150 peak, this is a very richly valued company priced for close-to-perfection.

The biggest risk is that carbon composite approach proves not to be viable for a launch vehicle of this size and RKLB has to fundamentally change the design. While I wouldn't have invested in this company if I thought that risk was >50%, it's definitely not as close to 0% as most retail investors seem to believe.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#208

Post by failuser »

proee wrote: post #41

We have a bright future full of endless "space-junk". As the price to orbit drops, people will inevitably send up more and more satellites that have questionable value. In 100 years will the sky at night just be a massive grid of dots moving across the sky? Who will create the first advertisement in space using satellites as pixels to create their company logo? Maybe they can add some color and animations for kicks.…

Wild that we already see “Kessler syndrome is a hoax” takes. I guess that should have been expected.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#209

Post by elzbardico »

dylan604 wrote: post #45
elzbardico wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's this thing called credit. People do this all the time, that's how they buy their first house (or at least used to...). Your net worth is basically zero beyond what you saved for the down payment, but the bank advances you the money to buy the house because it believes your future income streams will allow you to pay the principal plus an interest.

being able to foreclose on the house/property is a pretty decent protection for the bank that doesn't exist for a business though

Higher risk, higher premium.

Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium

#210

Post by 0x59 »

panick21_ wrote: post #169
BrandoElFollito wrote: post #151

As an ex-Motorolan (1998-2008), I sometimes look at what remains of the big mighty company and there is not much. Here in Europe it is even less, at least in the US you see the umpires (or somebody else, not sure as I fo not know baseball) with their half-headsets with the Motorola logo. It is a shame, I liked this company very much.

Just got a Motorola phone and I love it. 3.5mm audio jack and cheap.

My mobile is a Motorola as well!
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