00:00It seems like this bet is essentially one to say we are betting on Starship away from Falcon.
00:06Why is SpaceX making this bet?
00:08Yeah, totally. So Starship is key to basically all of Elon Musk's ambitions for SpaceX.
00:15That's sending data centers into space. That's expanding the Starlight Communications Network.
00:21And it's also sending humans to the moon and Mars.
00:24So essentially what this signals is kind of a, you know, a movement of the priority from Falcon 9 and,
00:32you know, the launch business that helped it make its name to focusing completely on Starship, building that rocket out
00:39and making it operational.
00:41So there's obviously, of course, the huge bet and the huge belief that Elon Musk has when it comes to
00:46SpaceX being able to really propel this to success.
00:50Do you think this is risky?
00:53Yeah. So with Musk, you really never know.
00:57While today he is saying, you know, we're not going to take any more Falcon 9 reservations past 2028.
01:04He could wake up tomorrow and say, you know, Starship isn't ready.
01:08We're going to keep extending how many Falcon rides we're doing.
01:12But right now, this is the course they're taking.
01:14They still have a little bit of wiggle room.
01:15It sounds like they are fully booked out until 2028.
01:19So things could always change.
01:21But, you know, I think it is definitely signaling their priorities for Starship.
01:27And that is like the route that they want to take for the for the future.
01:30Could you go go through in more detail the struggles that Starship has had?
01:35I know you and the team have been covering these test launches that they've continued to scrap.
01:39I believe yesterday they scrapped one for the second week in a row.
01:42Yes, totally. So Starship has had, you know, a really rocky development testing cycle.
01:48It is advertised as the most powerful rocket ever built.
01:51It is very massive.
01:53It is supposed to be fully reusable.
01:55So that means the booster, the part that, you know, boost the rocket to space and the and the top
02:01part are supposed to come back to the Earth intact so that the rocket can fly again, which is never
02:06done before.
02:07Like they don't even do that with their current Falcon 9 rocket.
02:11But, you know, they have had, as I mentioned, a rocky development cycle.
02:15They've had some explosions.
02:16They've had some setbacks just this week.
02:20You know, they had postponed the launch because some of the engines didn't ignite.
02:24And then yesterday they again postponed the launch to today because of bad weather, which that is pretty common in
02:31in rocketry.
02:32But, you know, today all eyes are on Starship.
02:35It is the first test flight since their IPO.
02:38So investors will be watching, I'm sure.
02:40But Sana, talk to us if Starship is not ready to launch missions by the end of 2028.
02:45What will happen if the company doesn't revert to the Falcon family?
02:48Yeah, so if Starship isn't ready and the company is deciding to, like, turn off access to orbit with their
02:54Falcon family, that could be really catastrophic for so many U.S. space companies that rely on SpaceX to get
03:02to orbit.
03:03SpaceX basically commands a near monopoly on launch.
03:07It launches.
03:08It's enabled the growth of all these large scale satellite networks because it launches more frequently than any other rocket
03:14in the world.
03:15So, you know, these Amazon's networks, you know, telecoms networks, satellite imagery networks, many of them rely on SpaceX to
03:23get to to get to orbit.
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