spaceflight

Northrop Grumman taps Firefly Aerospace to upgrade its Antares rocket to American-built engines

Chalk one up for the American broomsticks. Northrop Grumman has announced that it will partner with startup Firefly Aerospace to build an all-American version of its workhorse Antares rocket, which cu

China’s new Mars images show off the country’s robust (but secretive) space program

With a $24 billion budget and dozens of active, high-profile missions, it’s not surprising that NASA is the most visible of the dozens of government space agencies in the world. But China’

Watch Virgin Orbit’s ‘Straight Up’ launch of Space Force satellites live tonight

Update: The launch was delayed due to a slight problem with propellant temperature, but Virgin Orbit has confirmed it will make its next attempt tonight (July 1st) no earlier than 10:20 PM PDT. Update

French aerospace company Gama raises $2M to develop a solar sail spacecraft

Just as sea breezes propel sailboats across the sea on Earth, solar radiation might one day be able to propel spacecraft between the stars. Or at least that’s the hope of French startup Gama. The ae

Watch Rocket Lab launch a StriX satellite from its new launch pad in New Zealand live

Update: Successful launch and payload deployment per Rocket Lab. For its first launch of 2022, Rocket Lab is sending to orbit a StriX satellite for Japanese company Synspective via an Electron rocket

Clutter merges with MakeSpace to add scale to the business of moving and storage

Some consolidation is afoot in the world of moving and storage startups: Clutter and MakeSpace, two erstwhile rivals in the market, are merging to form a single company, which will operate under the C

In 2021, space investors watched stars form in real time

"Carl Sagan had it right, with Voyager and the pale blue dot: If you're anywhere else in the known universe, Earth is the most interesting place to study and be part of."

DevOps transformation: Taking edge computing and continuous updates to space

With the “final frontier” now open to private companies, how do we transform the way we continually update the software that runs in space?

Gitai successfully demos autonomous robot inside the International Space Station

Tokyo space startup Gitai Japan successfully conducted a technology demonstration of its autonomous robotic arm inside the International Space Station last week, a key milestone as the company prepare

To continue exploring space sustainably, we must act now

We’re at the start of a gold rush in outer space — and our track record for the sustainable development of any environment during gold rushes hasn’t been particularly noteworthy.

Peter Beck says Rocket Lab actively prepared for interplanetary missions ‘from day one’

Rocket Lab long ago graduated from underdog launch provider to industry heavyweight (with funding to match). Now the company is planning to go to the moon, Mars and Venus in the next decade.

Spaceflight will be ferrying payloads from Orbit Fab, GeoJump to lunar orbit next year

Space rideshare service provider Spaceflight Inc. is going to be shuttling customers on a lunar flyby mission next year, part of its long-term vision of giving companies easy access to lunar orbits an

We must subsidize and regulate space exploration

Space can and should be about much more than giving the 1% another Instagrammable moment and increasing the wealth of the billionaires who provide the service.

Ispace unveils bigger moon lander capable of surviving lunar nights

Ispace, a Japanese space startup that aims to lead the development of a lunar economy, has unveiled its design for a large lander that could go to the moon as early as 2024. Tokyo-based ispace said th

Suing your way to the stars

Hello friends, and welcome back to Week in Review! I’m back from a very fun and rehabilitative couple weeks away from my phone, my Twitter account and the news cycle. That said, I actually reall

Space manufacturing startup Varda inks deal with Rocket Lab for three spacecraft

Orbital manufacturing startup Varda Space Industries is moving fast. Only a few weeks after announcing a $42 million Series A, Varda has signed a deal with launch company Rocket Lab for three Photon s

Astra targets first commercial orbital launch for August 27

Astra’s last test launch went better than expected, nearly achieving orbit — kind of a stretch goal for that specific mission. The company at the time said that it would only need to tweak sof

Japanese startup ispace raises $46M to support planned moon missions

Japanese startup ispace has raised $46 million in a fresh round of Series C funding as it looks to complete three lunar lander missions in three years. The funding will go toward the second and third

US government watchdog rejects Blue Origin’s protest over lunar lander contract

The Government Accountability Office said that it was denying both Blue Origin’s protest and a separate challenge filed by Dynetics.

Varda Space Industries closes $42M Series A for off-planet manufacturing

Varda Space Industries has raised a $42 million Series A to bring to manufacturing a key capability that can only be found off-world: microgravity. The eight-month-old startup is looking to establish
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