4 ms·

IIRC the client gets a significant discount for accepting an experimental launch.

jessriedel 10y ago
> “We got a discount,” Halliwell said. “I can’t go into the specific pricing, but we did get a discount for being an early adopter of the technology.” > In response to a question whether the discount was closer to potential figures publicly disclosed by SpaceX’s Shotwell and SES chief executive Karim Sabbagh — who discussed possible reusability discounts of 30 percent and 50 percent, respectively — Halliwell said: “It certainly came out closer to Gwynne than to Karim.” > The figures, while stated as unofficial and somewhat arbitrary, illustrated the behind-the-scenes negotiation on the real price of a reused Falcon 9. > Halliwell did not confirm whether the ultimate price for the SES 10 launch fell between the 30 percent and 50 percent discount figures. > “We did receive a good discount on the baseline price,” he said. “It’s not as crazy or spectacular as you might think, and that makes sense. SpaceX has to supply an awful lot of equipment, and they have to do an awful lot of refurbishment. > “It is an interesting price, and it’s something which we believe will be meaningful going forward, and will be meaningful for the industry in the longer term,” he said. > SES says there was “no material change” to the insurance coverage or the company’s premium payment after cinching the agreement to launch SES 10 on a “flight-proven” rocket. https://spaceflightnow.com/2016/09/13/ses-stands-by-spacex-after-getting-good-discount-on-reused-rocket/ https://spaceflightnow.com/2016/09/13/ses-stands-by-spacex-a...
- simonh 10y ago
  > SpaceX has to supply an awful lot of equipment, and they have to do an awful lot of refurbishment. Right, they've already stated that with the current rocket there's no economical way to recover the second stage, which aren't cheap, and so far nobody knows how many launches the cores will be good for. Also the infrastructure for supporting the recovery efforts, including the drone ships and their operations, can't be cheap. I expect the SpaceX re-use project will probably be in the red economically for years before it starts paying off it's setup costs.
  - mikeash 10y ago
    The second stage is about a quarter of the total cost of the rocket, so the best case, if reusing the first stage cost nothing, is a 75% cost savings. I don't think refurbishment is going to cost all that much. They fired their "max damage" core eight times without any refurbishment and it did alright. The upcoming Block 5 version of the rocket is supposed to incorporate lots of changes to help with reusability. Lessons from the Shuttle are commonly brought up, but may not apply very much. Aside from being very different craft (with the Shuttle running on much thinner margins), a huge difference is that SpaceX is able to rapidly and strongly iterate as they learn. The Shuttle that first launched in 1981 was not all that different from the one that last launched in 2011. The design was not entirely set in stone when it started flying, but it was pretty close. That's what happens when your vehicles cost multiple billions of dollars each. SpaceX is continuing to build new rockets and that makes it a lot easier to make changes to react to experiences with older designs. I doubt the ships are all that expensive in the grand scheme of things. I'm sure the cost is more than what you or I could afford, but I don't think it's a particularly large fraction of the booster's multi-dozen-million-dollar cost. In any case, it will be great to see how it works out, rather than just talking about how it might work out!
    - simonh 10y ago
      Oh absolutely, it's a revolution in the making. In fact the limiting factor on their launch cadence in a few years might just be how quickly they can manufacture second stages. That would be a great problem to have.

> “We got a discount,” Halliwell said. “I can’t go into the specific pricing, but we did get a discount for being an early adopter of the technology.” > In response to a question whether the discount was closer to potential figures publicly disclosed by SpaceX’s Shotwell and SES chief executive Karim Sabbagh — who discussed possible reusability discounts of 30 percent and 50 percent, respectively — Halliwell said: “It certainly came out closer to Gwynne than to Karim.” > The figures, while stated as unofficial and somewhat arbitrary, illustrated the behind-the-scenes negotiation on the real price of a reused Falcon 9. > Halliwell did not confirm whether the ultimate price for the SES 10 launch fell between the 30 percent and 50 percent discount figures. > “We did receive a good discount on the baseline price,” he said. “It’s not as crazy or spectacular as you might think, and that makes sense. SpaceX has to supply an awful lot of equipment, and they have to do an awful lot of refurbishment. > “It is an interesting price, and it’s something which we believe will be meaningful going forward, and will be meaningful for the industry in the longer term,” he said. > SES says there was “no material change” to the insurance coverage or the company’s premium payment after cinching the agreement to launch SES 10 on a “flight-proven” rocket. https://spaceflightnow.com/2016/09/13/ses-stands-by-spacex-after-getting-good-discount-on-reused-rocket/ https://spaceflightnow.com/2016/09/13/ses-stands-by-spacex-a...

simonh 10y ago
> SpaceX has to supply an awful lot of equipment, and they have to do an awful lot of refurbishment. Right, they've already stated that with the current rocket there's no economical way to recover the second stage, which aren't cheap, and so far nobody knows how many launches the cores will be good for. Also the infrastructure for supporting the recovery efforts, including the drone ships and their operations, can't be cheap. I expect the SpaceX re-use project will probably be in the red economically for years before it starts paying off it's setup costs.
- mikeash 10y ago
  The second stage is about a quarter of the total cost of the rocket, so the best case, if reusing the first stage cost nothing, is a 75% cost savings. I don't think refurbishment is going to cost all that much. They fired their "max damage" core eight times without any refurbishment and it did alright. The upcoming Block 5 version of the rocket is supposed to incorporate lots of changes to help with reusability. Lessons from the Shuttle are commonly brought up, but may not apply very much. Aside from being very different craft (with the Shuttle running on much thinner margins), a huge difference is that SpaceX is able to rapidly and strongly iterate as they learn. The Shuttle that first launched in 1981 was not all that different from the one that last launched in 2011. The design was not entirely set in stone when it started flying, but it was pretty close. That's what happens when your vehicles cost multiple billions of dollars each. SpaceX is continuing to build new rockets and that makes it a lot easier to make changes to react to experiences with older designs. I doubt the ships are all that expensive in the grand scheme of things. I'm sure the cost is more than what you or I could afford, but I don't think it's a particularly large fraction of the booster's multi-dozen-million-dollar cost. In any case, it will be great to see how it works out, rather than just talking about how it might work out!
  - simonh 10y ago
    Oh absolutely, it's a revolution in the making. In fact the limiting factor on their launch cadence in a few years might just be how quickly they can manufacture second stages. That would be a great problem to have.