An Editorial
Last night’s announcement from SpaceX and T-Mobile, plus other recent movements by well-funded companies, is an illustration of something Starbridge has noticed over the past few years: space is now a hypercompetitive area where speed to market and speed to scale is now a significant part of any go-to-market strategy. Blitzscaling has entered the space industry.
This requires a significantly new skill set for founders. Early teams should include members from other tech sectors that have successfully managed hypergrowth startups. Marketing and sales teams need to be built much earlier.
All of this means that investment rounds will become much larger and faster as the company works to suck the oxygen out of the market. This is one reason why Starbridge is raising $125M for Fund III: the way to ensure success for our early investments is to make sure portfolio companies have the capital to move faster.
But, unlike the SaaS world where blitzscaling can happen in weeks and months, our sector is one of hardware and hardware by nature is different. Blitzscaling with hardware requires agile management methods and extremely tight 'build, test, debug' cycles that are very ‘hardware rich’. Time is more valuable than Inconel.
Portfolio Company News
SpaceX/Lynk
T-Mobile phones will connect to Starlink for free starting next year
Yesterday, T-Mobile (CEO, Mike Sievert) and SpaceX (CEO, Elon Musk) announced that starting next year, Starlink satellites will begin connecting directly to phones over existing cellular bands enabling global roaming wherever Starlink’s coverage exists and may be added for free to certain T-Mobile plans.
As you may recall, Starbridge portfolio company Lynk already demonstrated a direct satellite-to-cell phone connection last year and plans to begin launching its initial commercial services soon. “Having Elon validate this as a service is great. It’s a huge need, a huge market, and a huge validation,” Lynk CEO, Charles Miller.
Axiom
Axiom taps Epsilon3 software platform for space station development
Software startup, Epsilon3, is developing a workflow platform for Axiom to help coordinate their ground and on-orbit operations. Epsilon3 recently raised $15M to further develop its project management suite focused on coordinating space development workflows.
General Space News
SLS Launch of Artemis I mission on Monday, Aug 29th
NASA plans to launch their first test flight of SLS on Monday, Aug 29th which will be launching the Artemis 1 mission along with 10 cubesats from the US, Italy’s ASI, and Japan’s JAXA that will be prospecting for lunar ice, flying by asteroids, studying space weather and radiation in cislunar space, deep-space communications, etc. NASA’s Artemis I mission will fly the Orion spacecraft around the moon in order to test its capabilities before splashing down in California about 6 weeks later and will enable NASA to proceed with Artemis 2, their first crewed Orion mission, as soon as late 2024.
NASA and Boeing push back first Starliner astronaut mission to 2023
Starliner’s crewed launch date has now been pushed back to February 2023 due to several major issues that were identified during its uncrewed flight back in May.
‘State of the space industrial base’ report calls for a national plan to compete with China
Director of the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), Michael Brown, warned that “China could surpass the US in space superiority if we don’t increase our investment” during an Atlantic Council event discussing their ‘State of the Space Industrial Base’ report. The report calls for an increase in public-private partnerships and an increase in government contract revenue to commercial companies focusing on space infrastructures such as space mining, manufacturing, and solar energy.
NASA asks industry for input on ISS deorbit capabilities
NASA issued an RFI to help develop a spacecraft to deorbit the ISS at the end of the station's life to help it break up in the atmosphere over the South Pacific Ocean.
An FCC commissioner criticized stripping Starlink rural broadband subsidies.
Whether its allocation of limited spectrum or administration of telecom subsidies, the FCC has become one of the battlegrounds where large telecom companies battle for influence. The semi-factional and partisan nature of the assignment of commissioners to the FCC can exacerbate those battles. This public statement by one of the four Commissioners suggests that the fights between telecom providers are becoming so vicious that the Commissioners feel they must comment on it and the potential impact it has on the ethics of the entire process.
Other Space News
NASA is asking for industry input on a proposed deorbit vehicle for the International Space Station.
China is making progress on two heavy-lift vehicles that would support future human lunar missions.
A proposed commercial space station has passed a NASA review.
A new report warns that commercial satellite operators have to deal with being targets of attacks in international conflicts.
Boeing has delivered twin SES communications satellites to Florida for launch this fall.
In-space services startup Scout Space has won two Space Force contracts.