French startup gets another space station cargo contract
The French startup The Exploration Company has gotten its fourth contract for its proposed Nyx unmanned reusable cargo capsule, signing a deal with Vast to fly one freighter mission to its proposed second Haven station.
This startup, which has not yet flown anything, already had contracts to fly one cargo mission to ISS (a demo mission for the European Space Agency), one to Axiom’s space station, and three to Voyager Space’s Starlab station. This new contract means The Exploration Company already has a manifest of six missions.
These contracts pose a puzzle. Why is this startup getting all these deals, but not Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus or SpaceX’s Dragon capsules? Or have these two American companies signed deals without the same PR splash?
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The French startup The Exploration Company has gotten its fourth contract for its proposed Nyx unmanned reusable cargo capsule, signing a deal with Vast to fly one freighter mission to its proposed second Haven station.
This startup, which has not yet flown anything, already had contracts to fly one cargo mission to ISS (a demo mission for the European Space Agency), one to Axiom’s space station, and three to Voyager Space’s Starlab station. This new contract means The Exploration Company already has a manifest of six missions.
These contracts pose a puzzle. Why is this startup getting all these deals, but not Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus or SpaceX’s Dragon capsules? Or have these two American companies signed deals without the same PR splash?
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in the past two weeks has the mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuses to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
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These contracts pose a puzzle. Why is this startup getting all these deals, but not Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus or SpaceX’s Dragon capsules? Or have these two American companies signed deals without the same PR splash?
The ESA contract is not hard to guess. They want to bootstrap their own startup(s), just like NASA did with COTS.
The other two…I cannot help but wonder if there was an unpublicized quid pro quo. Axiom and Vast are no doubt keen to land some business from ESA on their stations when the time comes, and perhaps agreeing to a Nyx cargo mission is one of the things they offered to get ESA to sign agreements.
Obviously, both stations will require a lot more in the way of resupply, so the rubber will hit the road when those have to start being lined up. And yes, it could be the case that discussions have already been happening with SpaceX, Northrop, and even Sierra.
Starship is the wildcard in this. If The Exploration Company has launched nothing, it’s a good bet that Starship will be up and running by the time they do – even if it takes years.
I can see a market for small satellite launches lasting beyond Starship, but cargo to a space station? Not so much. Why send dribs and drabs when you can send everything, including the kitchen sink, in one Starship launch?
I don’t see Dragon lasting beyond the ISS. It’s just too small. Why bother?
Mark Sizer asked: “I can see a market for small satellite launches lasting beyond Starship, but cargo to a space station? Not so much. Why send dribs and drabs when you can send everything, including the kitchen sink, in one Starship launch?”
For one, “everything” may be too much. There is a lot of capacity on Starship, and there may not be that much volume on board this third generation of space stations. It is kind of like doing a year’s worth of shopping in one trip; do you have the pantry and refrigerator space for all the groceries, and do you have space for all the supplies for next year’s various projects?
Another possible problem is handling the mass and moment of inertia of Starship could be overwhelming for the control systems of these space stations. A brief stay for Starship may not be too much for these control systems, but it could be bad for a long stay.
There could be some significant stresses induced during a Starship docking, being a good ten times more mass than a Dragon, Cygnus, or Nyx. Are they designed to handle these stresses?
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Robert asked: “These contracts pose a puzzle. Why is this startup getting all these deals, but not Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus or SpaceX’s Dragon capsules? Or have these two American companies signed deals without the same PR splash?”
My first guess is that Cygnus and especially Dragon do not necessarily need a lot of lead time from contract to launch. Dragons are just sitting around waiting for next flight, and Cygnus is established enough that it may not need a long lead time to manufacture.
My second guess is that new NewSpace companies need more assurance for their investors, and companies that expect to use them need to make these deals early, before investors can get spooked. If these space station companies expect to use these new cargo companies, they need to assure the investors that their investments will pay off.
As I recall, SpaceX does not plan to make more Dragons (manned or otherwise), so they seem to expect new companies to take over this market, allowing SpaceX to venture into even newer markets.