FYI,

"Entrepreneurs Envision a Sea Change in Commercial Space"
Space.com
http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20071022/sc_space/entrepreneursenvisiona
seachangeincommercialspace;_ylt=Aia379fwUt3m2d7VG.MUidME1vAI

: Entrepreneurial companies are determined to reshape the commercial
: space industry in the years ahead with ventures designed to reduce
: the cost of access to space. The wide scope of projects includes
: the development of vehicles for suborbital tourism, eventually
: leading to orbital vehicles that could provide transportation to
: and from lower cost habitats and laboratories in space and even
: take advantage of one of the planned orbiting fuel depots.

: But bullish predictions such as these must be tempered by the
: realities of a gauntlet of policy, technology, finance and
: regulatory issues facing all of the entrepreneurs trying to provide
: public access across the space frontier.

: Representatives from several leading private space groups addressed
: their assessment of those challenges and their approach to solving
: them during a Sept. 19 panel discussion at a conference entitled,
: "Space: The Next 50 Years," organized by the American Institute of
: Aeronautics and Astronautics, and Boeing.

: Jason Andrews, president of Andrews Space, in Seattle, predicted
: that vehicles capable of horizontal takeoff and airplane-like
: operations not only will reduce launch costs, but also stimulate
: new business in low Earth orbit and ultimately out to the Moon.

: "I think we're going to see a sea change in space transportation
: from the Earth's surface to low Earth orbit," Andrews said, coupled
: with universal infrastructure like common interfaces and docking
: systems. Policy issues such as resource utilization, even land
: ownership on the Moon, he added, will need sorting out in the years
: to come.

: Some of the early projects are well underway. Scaled Composites LLC
: of Mojave, Calif., for example is busy building SpaceShipTwo, a
: passenger-carrying suborbital vehicle, for Sir Richard Branson's
: Virgin Galactic spaceline. Burt Rutan, Scaled's president and chief
: executive officer said that he found himself in the unusual
: position with SpaceShipTwo of having a program "that's announced,
: but not unveiled."

: Rutan said the company's long-range plan is to build perhaps as
: many as 40 or 50 spaceships in the future for a variety of
: customers. Scaled Composites already has increased its staff and
: floor space by a factor of about two-and-a-half in the last couple
: of years. "All that growth is not in commercial space ... about
: 45 percent of it is," Rutan said.

: "What we are developing is something that we expect to be
: competitive 20 to 30 years from now," Rutan said.

: Rutan said the problem with space as a business is the lack of
: payloads. For now, flying people in space is the only payload that
: makes any business sense, Rutan said. Doing so, he said, will
: foster needed breakthroughs in safety and lower operating costs.

: Jeff Greason, president and chief executive officer for XCOR
: Aerospace in Mojave said that predicting routine suborbital
: passenger spaceflight "is like predicting when the egg is going to
: drop when it's already on the way to the floor." Not only is it
: going to happen, Greason stressed, there also will be multiple
: players vying for a market larger than what was expected just a few
: years ago.

: That translates into faster price drops than first anticipated,
: "because that's what competition does," Greason said.

: Debra Facktor Lepore, president of AirLaunch LLC, headquartered in
: Kirkland, Washington, likened the current crop of space
: entrepreneurial firms as the "Wild West," forecasting that today's
: private space companies will become more mainstream – eventually
: replaced by another set of entrepreneurs with those "really wacky
: ideas."

: One big roadblock to the wider use of affordable small launchers
: and payloads, Lepore said, is the U.S. International Traffic in
: Arms Regulations (ITAR), which make it difficult, and in some cases
: impossible, for U.S. companies to do space business abroad. ITAR,
: she said, stifles the creation of international partnerships. As a
: result, she predicted, some nations will march ahead of the United
: States in technology, putting U.S. technological competitiveness at
: risk.

: Lepore also stressed that it is important for small businesses and
: entrepreneurs to maintain their commercial and intellectual
: property rights – even if they receive full or partial government
: funding of their projects. "That's your real asset, and protecting
: that is paramount."

: Lawrence Williams, vice president for international and government
: affairs for Space Exploration Technologies of El Segundo, Calif.,
: said innovation and low prices can be realized if the U.S.
: government facilitates true and open competition. That will
: permit "hard-charging, aggressive entrepreneurs" to change the
: space industry – but only if the U.S. government removes financial
: economic inefficiencies, such as the enormous subsidies for the
: companies who participate in the U.S. Air Force's Evolved
: Expendable Launch Vehicle program.

: Rutan cautioned that the "little guys" should avoid government
: funding. "I think it's the worst place to get money. You've got
: hundreds of people who are on your board of directors and each one
: has their own agenda," he said, and it's a relationship that leads
: to not taking risks and realizing breakthroughs, he concluded.

Mark Reiff