Kit Eaton, Columnist, Pathfounders (DeepTech)
“Space…the final frontier.” It’s been 60 years since Star Trek’s intro first aired, and it still applies to real-world space technology, which remains a fascinating, controversial, expensive battleground. It’s also a great place to start this DeepTech column for Pathfounders. Because cutting-edge space tech - sometimes called “New Space” - highlights a startling difference between European and American mentalities.
In Texas, Elon Musk’s SpaceX hit the eleventh test launch of its Starship rocket system. The 123 meter tall stainless steel experimental rocket is already the tallest, largest, heaviest, and most powerful one humans have ever made, and unlike every other one built, both parts (booster and “ship”) are designed to be reusable — with a goal of dramatically reducing the cost of sending satellites into orbit. SpaceX is applying many of the lessons learned from its existing partly reusable Falcon 9 rocket, a vehicle that’s already flown over 500 times, with over 150 of those launches set for this year alone.
Meanwhile, in Europe? Just a few days ago, Italian aerospace company Avio signed a $40 million contract with the European space agency ESA to build and test a small, but very Starship-like “reusable rocket stage demonstrator.” If all goes well, in about 2 years, the roughly 23-meter-tall prototype may hurtle into space on top of what’s thought to be a version of the “disposable” P120C solid rocket system Avio already makes for Europe’s small Vega C launcher. According to ESA the plan is to refine the “requirements, the design and the technologies” for an upper-stage rocket demonstrator that “in the future could return to Earth and be reused on another flight.”
It’s not just about these two rocket projects, of course. There are dozens of other startups across the world that are aiming at transforming access to space, from Germany’s Rocket Factory Ausberg to the US/New Zealand-based Rocket Lab to numerous Chinese efforts like Landspace, all of which are working on their own reusable rocket prototypes. For most of these the goal is to dramatically reduce the cost of launching stuff into orbit, to the moon, Mars and beyond — a goal that could energize dozens of other VC-funded startups (outside of China, at least) that build cheap, innovative satellite systems for communications, in-orbit manufacturing, and, hell, maybe one day even entertainment (we can’t let Amazon’s Jeff Bezos hold the monopoly on space-based joyriding with his phallic-looking New Shepard rocket, can we?).
But while red-tape-loving Europeans are inching (millimetering?) forward on space tech with deals like Avio’s, they are years away from matching even the basic specs of SpaceX’s 7-year-old, partly-reusable Falcon 9 rocket, even while America is sending thousands of tons of experimental stainless steel into the skies at 25 times the speed of sound.
What drives this difference? Is it simply a question of raw cash? Is it an issue about spending mentality, and polar-opposite risk-taking strategies? Is it a difference in the ability of European startups to innovate at scale, and with the same kind of test-until-it-explodes momentum as US startups can manage? For space technology, it really is a problem: one of Europe’s top technology investors, Bernard Liautaud, managing partner at Balderton Capital, recently told the Financial Times that European countries are too dependent on US companies for both launches and satellite tech, putting the continent at “huge risk”.
We can switch topics to AI for a moment to talk about money. Last week, the EU announced a €1 billion plan to boost AI use in the bloc and cut dependence on American or Chinese-based AI (plus the wildly expensive chips needed to power huge AI data centers). In a statement, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said, “I want the future of AI to be made in Europe,” but will a billion euros make the difference, or is this mere political puffery?
Sure, AI advances are being made in Europe: last week Norway-based browser company Opera launched its new Neon product — a fully AI-integrated browser that can surf the net like any other browser, but which can also, with a tap of the keyboard, write you code, build a web app to your specifications, generate AI imagery and even plan and then book you a holiday abroad. It’s the future of web browsing…and Opera’s a small private company lacking the scale of rivals like Google or Apple. But Opera notes its AI systems are “based on several Large Language Models (LLMs) (e.g. Generative Pre-trained Transformer built by OpenAI or Google).” And Opera is estimated to have captured less than 2% of the global browser market, despite beating billion-dollar US rivals like OpenAI to market with a full AI-powered browser. Just like space tech, you have to wonder if European AI efforts are too little, too cheap, too late?
Back to rockets: The other day at Italian Tech Week, investors were sipping Chianti in Torino, and while Avio was talking with ESA about beginning-to-plan-to-form a committee to demonstrate a prototype rocket that “in the future” could be reused, Elon Musk’s rocket company was getting ready to test fly 5,000 tons of reusable rocket.
Just like Kirk and crew, the push for the final frontier (in space, and other deep tech) may be an American enterprise. The question is: Can we afford not to keep up?