Recent Developments

For more than half a century, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has always been considered the monolith in space exploration in the United States. This dramatically changed in the last decade with the end of the Space Shuttle Program in 2011, paving the way for unique collaboration opportunities with the private sector.

SpaceX is one of many innovative private space flight companies, most known for their Falcon 9 and Dragon missions in collaboration with NASA. This unique partnership between NASA and SpaceX has paved the way for work with the Artemis program and additional resupply missions to the International Space Station (ISS). More information is linked here.

Similar to SpaceX, Blue Origin has been conducting a variety of tests in conjunction with NASA across multiple sectors, including robotics, cargo optimizations, and 3D printing. Both Blue Origin and SpaceX use reusable rockets to improve cost-effectiveness and interoperability between systems. Recent updates on this partnership linked here.

In 2016, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) estimated the space industry to be worth more than $150 billion. With this industry heating up in recent years, there are numerous private spaceflight companies that are beginning to crop up to fill niche aspects of this ever-changing industry.