U.S./Russian owned launch company ILS cuts workforce by 25%
The competition heats up: Business loses because of its recent Proton launch failures, combined with strong market competition from SpaceX, today forced International Launch Services (ILS) to cut its work force by 25%.
The company is anticipating a launch rate drop from an average of 7 to 8 missions a year down to 3 to 4. The article also noted one more additional detail that will affect the future market value of Proton:
So far in 2014, the commercial satellites ordered have been mainly at the lighter end of the market for geostationary-orbiting telecommunications spacecraft. This follows a couple of years in which heavier satellites dominated.
Commercial Proton rockets are typically used to launch heavier satellites one at a time. The market’s move to lighter spacecraft has benefited Space Exploration Technologies Corp. of Hawthorne, California, whose Falcon 9 rocket has accumulated commercial orders; and also benefited Arianespace, whose Ariane 5 heavy-lift vehicle’s lower position is reserved for smaller satellites.
The weight of commercial satellites is almost certainly going to continue to drop in the coming years as technology improves and satellite companies work to reduce the cost to launch. In that climate, the Proton’s ability to put big commercial payloads into orbit will become a liability, not an asset. Ariane 5 has the same problem, in that it still needs a big payload for its upper position in order to make a launch cost effective.
Both Falcon 9, with its very low launch costs, and Russia’s new Angara rocket, with its modular design to handle all kinds of payload sizes, are better suited to this new competitive market.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
The competition heats up: Business loses because of its recent Proton launch failures, combined with strong market competition from SpaceX, today forced International Launch Services (ILS) to cut its work force by 25%.
The company is anticipating a launch rate drop from an average of 7 to 8 missions a year down to 3 to 4. The article also noted one more additional detail that will affect the future market value of Proton:
So far in 2014, the commercial satellites ordered have been mainly at the lighter end of the market for geostationary-orbiting telecommunications spacecraft. This follows a couple of years in which heavier satellites dominated.
Commercial Proton rockets are typically used to launch heavier satellites one at a time. The market’s move to lighter spacecraft has benefited Space Exploration Technologies Corp. of Hawthorne, California, whose Falcon 9 rocket has accumulated commercial orders; and also benefited Arianespace, whose Ariane 5 heavy-lift vehicle’s lower position is reserved for smaller satellites.
The weight of commercial satellites is almost certainly going to continue to drop in the coming years as technology improves and satellite companies work to reduce the cost to launch. In that climate, the Proton’s ability to put big commercial payloads into orbit will become a liability, not an asset. Ariane 5 has the same problem, in that it still needs a big payload for its upper position in order to make a launch cost effective.
Both Falcon 9, with its very low launch costs, and Russia’s new Angara rocket, with its modular design to handle all kinds of payload sizes, are better suited to this new competitive market.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Why don’t they just increase the minimum wage that they pay and solve all of the problems?