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> They are planning some form of reusability in the future, just because they have to, if they want to drastically reduce costs [0]. That looks promising at le
by elric 2y ago
> They are planning some form of reusability in the future, just because they have to, if they want to drastically reduce costs [0].
That looks promising at least.
> A thing that is not happening is letting private companies innovate in this space in Europe, as Ariane is still mostly government funded in the EU.
I'm not sure how true that is. I was part of an ESA project around ~2009, and some of my friends are in the space industry. It seems to be mostly private sector companies working together with ESA. You're right that it's not the same as SpaceX, but I don't think it's the case that ESA isn't "letting" private companies innovate.
- nkoren 2y agoAriane 6 is a worthy competitor to the Falcon 9 -- if it hadn't become partially reusable. If it had reached the market 15 years ago, it could have been relevant. Ariane Next could be a worthy competitor to the Falcon 9R, if they manage to get it to market by, say, 2020. Looks like they're planning to be about 15 years late to market there as well. They've also got a fully-reusable Starship competitor in the works -- can't be bothered to dig up the link for it, sorry -- which if the schedule holds, should hit the market about 20 years after Starship enters commercial service.