New Zealand startup successfully launches rocket • Hacker News Board

Re: New Zealand startup successfully launches rocket

#101

Post by snrplfth » Mon, Jan 22, 2018, 7:32 PM UTC

toomanybeersies wrote: post #8

It's interesting seeing the difference between the publicity that SpaceX gets, and the publicity of other rocket companies like RocketLab get. It shows how effective the PR machine for SpaceX is. RocketLabs launch is pretty significant, considering it's the first orbital launch of a rocket designed and built in a small nation. This has barely hit the news. I guess part of the reason is that it's not in the USA, and t…

Also this is a cryogenic rocket which has to be kept cold and launched soon after fueling. Not terribly good for nuclear launches.

Re: New Zealand startup successfully launches rocket

#102

Post by vorg » Tue, Jan 23, 2018, 7:04 PM UTC

snrplfth wrote: post #100

vorg wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically, New Zealand's a "country", but to call it a "new country" is pushing it. It's a cultural appendage to the U.K. and the U.S. West Coast, with a bit of Hong Kong thrown in. It's the unitary state that never joined Australia in 1901, being listed in the Australian Constitution as one of its 7 candidate states. It would have joined the Australian Federation if refrigerated shipping hadn't have been invented…

I'm pretty sure that toomanybeersies means new country as in, "a country from which an orbital rocket has never been launched before", rather than "a country which is new". Edit: Also, as far as I can tell, agriculture including meats is only 8% of New Zealand's economy. Hardly the "main industry". Like most high-income industrialized economies, most of the economy is in services.

Whoops, I should've read that phrase "new country" in context.

As for your edit about NZ's economy being mainly "services", if you subtract industries owned/controlled by Australia/US/UK (e.g banks, TV content), re-apportion industries servicing the Ag/Meat/Milk/Wool/Forestry/Fisheries industry as being part of that industry, and do similar for industries servicing "Human Arrivals" (e.g. house construction being part of Immigration/International Ed), then you end up with the two big drivers of New Zealand's economy: Human Arrivals and Primary Production. They don't fit into the official categories in the govt's accounting system, but they're the real engines of NZ's economy. The rest are just hangers-on.

Re: New Zealand startup successfully launches rocket

#103

Post by snrplfth » Tue, Jan 23, 2018, 7:50 PM UTC

vorg wrote: post #102

snrplfth wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that toomanybeersies means new country as in, "a country from which an orbital rocket has never been launched before", rather than "a country which is new". Edit: Also, as far as I can tell, agriculture including meats is only 8% of New Zealand's economy. Hardly the "main industry". Like most high-income industrialized economies, most of the economy is in services.

Whoops, I should've read that phrase "new country" in context. As for your edit about NZ's economy being mainly "services", if you subtract industries owned/controlled by Australia/US/UK (e.g banks, TV content), re-apportion industries servicing the Ag/Meat/Milk/Wool/Forestry/Fisheries industry as being part of that industry, and do similar for industries servicing "Human Arrivals" (e.g. house construction being part…

The fact that certain industries have a lot of foreign ownership doesn't mean that they're not part of the actual economy. They produce in NZ, they employ in NZ, they buy inputs in NZ - they're part of NZ's GDP economy.

And the rest of your statement makes no sense. Some tertiary industries service primary industries, but most don't. Some housebuilding and education services immigrants, but the vast majority isn't, and regardless of that fact, it still counts as part of the local GDP. Services are no less "real" than resource industries.

Re: New Zealand startup successfully launches rocket

#104

Post by manicdee » Thu, Feb 01, 2018, 7:18 AM UTC

jessriedel wrote: post #76

manicdee wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SpaceX simply doesn’t have the launch cadence to be anywhere near as useful to certain markets as Rocketlabs will be. Specifically, RL is ideal for a series of small satellites launched at a regular cadence to perform e.g. atmospheric studies. For this niche, booking ride shares requires booking a seat years in advance through a launch broker and then accepting whatever delays eventuate for the entire payload. If a c…

The timescale point is fine, but it doesn't support the suggestion that RL will go beyond niche (which private road vehicles obviously do). The reason is that the overwhelming limiting factor on launching more satellites is cost, not slow pace. Do you know of projections for RL future market share? I conjecture less than 5% of total satellite launch market.

I am speculating that RL will carve out a niche which is launches for satellites that need a regular cadence at a pace faster than SpaceX can afford.

So for example rather than spending $50M launching 1 x $150M satellite to slowly gather outer atmospheric studies over a period of decades, launch 50 x $3M satellites with $1M launch costs to gather more data over a shorter period of time.