Outside of several mentions in the Rocket Report newsletter dating back to 2018, Ars Technica has not devoted too much attention to covering a novel California space company named SpinLaunch.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s because the premise is so outlandish as to almost not feel real. The company aims to build a kinetic launch system that spins a rocket around at speeds up to 4,700 mph (7,500 km\/h) before sending it upward toward space. Then, at an altitude of 40 miles (60 km) or so, the rocket would ignite its engines to achieve orbital velocity. Essentially, SpinLaunch wants to yeet things into space.<\/p>\n
But the company was no joke. After being founded in 2014, it raised more than $150 million over the next decade. It built a prototype accelerator in New Mexico and performed a series of flight tests. The flights reached altitudes of \u201ctens of thousands\u201d of feet, according to the company, and were often accompanied by slickly produced videos.<\/p>\n
Following this series of tests, by the end of 2022, the company went mostly quiet. It was unclear whether it ran out of funding, had hit some technical problems in trying to build a larger accelerator, or what. Somewhat ominously, SpinLaunch\u2019s founder and chief executive, Jonathan Yaney, was replaced without explanation last May. The new leader would be David Wrenn, then serving as chief operating officer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am confident in our ability to execute on the company\u2019s mission and bring our integrated tech stack of low-cost space solutions to market,\u201d Wrenn said at the time. \u201cI look forward to sharing more details about our near- and long-term strategy in the coming months.\u201d<\/p>\n
Words like \u201ctech stack\u201d and \u201clow-cost space solutions\u201d sounded like nebulous corporate speak, and it was not clear what they meant. Nor did Wrenn immediately deliver on that promise, nearly a year ago, to share more details about the company\u2019s near- and long-term strategy.<\/p>\n
,<\/p>\n
Wrenn and SpinLaunch finally broke their silence this week, and it definitely left some heads spinning. The company made several announcements on Thursday:<\/p>\n
It was a lot to take in at once. But the key point here is that for a decade, the company appeared to be focused on a (potentially) revolutionary method of accelerating rockets into space using a centrifuge but was now pivoting to building a mega-constellation. And initially, at least, this constellation would be launched using plain old chemical rockets.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a hard pivot. Ars spoke with Wrenn on Thursday afternoon to better understand what is happening here.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe launch market is relatively small compared to the economic potential of satellite communication,\u201d Wrenn said. \u201cLaunch has generally been more of a cost center than a profit center. Satcom will be a much larger piece of the overall industry.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said SpinLaunch began thinking about satellites about five years ago as it developed its launch system, which puts far higher gravitational loads on payloads\u2014literally thousands of G\u2019s\u2014as they spin in the centrifuge.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was quite natural for us,\u201d Wrenn said. \u201cWe were thinking about how you build satellites for SpinLaunch and how you could deploy and maintain satellites with SpinLaunch. How do you build very high-performing satellites and small form factors?\u201d<\/p>\n
,<\/p>\n
The launch market has changed substantially over the last decade. Whereas launch was rare and expensive at the time, thanks largely to the Falcon 9 rocket and SpaceX, it is increasingly ubiquitous. The number of orbital launches, globally, has roughly tripled. A generation of new medium-lift launch vehicles with elements of reuse is coming online. And the small launch business has proven to be economically challenging. It likely would cost SpinLaunch hundreds of millions of dollars, if not more, to develop a full-scale accelerator for orbital launches, and then you need specially built rockets. From the outside, that seems like a difficult business case to close.<\/p>\n
So the company is diversifying. But can a constellation like Meridian work? Wrenn said the initial plan is to deploy about 250 satellites, each with a mass of 150 pounds (70 kg). The goal is to limit power usage and use modern, miniaturized technology such as \u201cultra-efficient reflectarray antennas\u201d to pack a lot of capability into a small satellite. More details can be found here.<\/p>\n
Basically, the company is seeking to launch a constellation with roughly the same data capacity, about 2 \u201csellable\u201d terabits, as the OneWeb constellation now operated by Eutelsat. But instead of doing this with larger satellites and 20 launches as OneWeb did, Wrenn said the company\u2019s constellation of smaller satellites could be lofted by a single large rocket or perhaps two medium-lift rockets.<\/p>\n
The goal is to fly a demonstration mission in 2026, launch its first commercial satellites no earlier than late 2027, and then begin selling communications services after that, primarily to enterprise (businesses and possibly governments).<\/p>\n
It seems like a big ask to deliver the same global communications constellation as OneWeb with an order of magnitude fewer launches. But at the same time, the technology in the OneWeb satellites is more than a decade old. There have been a lot of advances made since then.<\/p>\n
Time will tell whether the new announcement is spin or not.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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