Space industry

“ Nowhere do we so effectively demonstrate our technological leadership and ability to make life better on Earth. The Space Age is barely a quarter of a century old. But already we've pushed civilization forward with our advances in science and technology. Opportunities and jobs will multiply as we cross new thresholds of knowledge and reach deeper into the unknown.
Our progress in space--taking giant steps for all mankind--is a tribute to American teamwork and excellence. Our finest minds in government, industry, and academia have all pulled together. ”

“ Many Western academic institutions, NGO's, and commercial interests created frameworks for collaboration with space scientists from Central Asia, Central and Eastern Europe, Russia, CIS, and NIS. The University of Maryland pioneered this trend with its East-West Space Science Center, formed in 1990.
The space industry - and particularly the emerging field of launch technologies - represents one of the few areas in which the former communist countries may retain a competitive edge and a relative advantage. The West would do well to encourage the commercialization of this knowledge. ”

“ An industrial change is upon us comparable to the advent of mercantilism." [29] He has predicted that within a decade or so the astronautics industry will be larger than the automotive industry of the entire world. ”

“ It’s an effort that will help prepare this already skilled workforce for new opportunities in the space industry and beyond.
So this is the next chapter that we can write together here at NASA. We will partner with industry. We will invest in cutting-edge research and technology. We will set far-reaching milestones and provide the resources to reach those milestones. And step by step, we will push the boundaries not only of where we can go but what we can do. ”

“ China adopts a holistic approach in building its space industry. It mobilizes and guides different sectors to take part in and contribute to this key industry, and coordinates all relevant activities under an overall plan. It ensures that technology plays a greater role in promoting and guiding space science and applications, and it facilitates the growth of new forms and models of business for the industry. These measures aim to raise the quality and overall performance of China's space industry. ”

“ To strengthen the industrial and supply chains of its space industry and transform and upgrade the basic capabilities of the industry, China will optimize the industrial structure and upgrade R&D, manufacturing, launch operations, and application services, further integrate industrialization with information technology, and build intelligent production lines, workshops and institutes. ”

“ Probably the first opportunities for private investment will come in the commercial use of satellites. Looking even further into the future of space exploration, perhaps there would be economic justification for a privately owned launching service that would put objects into space for the peaceful purposes of friendly governments, international agencies, industry, and the universities. ”

“ Scientists from NASA, universities, and private industry will do research in and around the space station—research that's only possible in the zero-gravity and vacuum of space. As needed, private industry will fund expansions of the NASA facility where companies can manufacture new products and provide new services. ”

“ Also, to encourage research and development, we've been working in partnership with industry and academia to expand basic research opportunities, achieve new breakthroughs, and give U.S.. companies making space-age products a boost on the way to the marketplace.
As our country moves into high-tech industries, space will be a big part of the future. As space-related businesses take off, the economy will benefit. ”

“ Much of the electronics industry is devoted to missile and space needs. The communications, chemical, and metallurgical industries are increasingly involved. These industries are already among the largest employers in the United States, and they are the major employers of the Nation's technical manpower. Hence we are not speaking of a minor element in the national economy, but of its leading growth industries. [46]
This phase of the space program's value should not be eyed merely from the standpoint of scientists and the labor market. ”

“ This will provide more advanced, economical, high-quality products and convenient services for all industries and sectors and for mass consumption. New business models for upscaling the space economy such as travel, biomedicine, debris removal and experiment services will be developed to expand the industry. ”

“ We are preeminent in the development of our electronic skills in radio, television, telephone and telegraphy. This entire industrial-scientific base is available to apply its art through satellite systems to the civilian needs of the world.
The exploitation of a new area of industrial opportunity for civilian use is normally left by our government to private enterprise. However, in the case of these important space systems, the development investment required is so large that it is beyond the financial resources of even our largest private industry. ”

“ So if we can accept the wrenches which space exploration is apt to apply to our time, pocketbook, energy, and thinking, the values and rewards as outlined in this report should gather headway and grow continuously greater.
Space technology is probably the fastest moving, typically free-enterprise and democratic industry yet created. ”

“ The regulations in force on permits for space launch projects, registration of space-related items, and permits for scientific and technological research and production have been improved to guide and regulate various space-related activities in accordance with the law, which provides legal guarantee for building China's space industry. ”

“ Whether or not we think of the missile-space business as being a self-contained industry, the requirements and exigencies of space exploration can be expected to result in the creation of new or greatly strengthened industrial branches, for example:
Research
This phase of the American economy is having a phenomenal growth. Not only have many established industries now placed research high on their organizational charts, but hundreds, perhaps thousands, of new businesses are springing up which are entirely devoted to research and development. ”

“ In brief, space exploration is becoming almost an industry in itself, and there are those who believe it destined to become the largest industrial spur in the Nation before too many years have gone by.
One expert, an experienced hand not only in astronautics but in the business world as well, describes the outlook in this fashion: "A great industrial change is taking place in the United States. The aircraft industry, which long considered missiles as a small department, now finds itself becoming a part of the large missile and space [Pg 19] flight industry. It is an elemental evolution. ”

“ In addition to these must be added the men and women employed by private industry in a capacity not directly related to the space program but whose jobs have been created nonetheless by its stimulus.
The fact is that the military and peaceful needs of the space program are already employing a significant percentage of the industrial work force, and will make up an even larger proportion of total employment and production of the country as the years go by. The aircraft industry, for example, is broadening its scope to include missile and space technologies. ”

“ Inasmuch as other nations, those which generally have lagged behind the United States in technical know-how, are now rapidly bringing their technology up to date—this windfall from our space program is especially opportune. It is providing the incentive to American industry to remain in the world's technological van. And it is emphasizing that economic leadership is a dynamic thing, that U.S. mass-production techniques which have enabled the Nation to compete so well in foreign markets are no longer, of themselves, sufficient guarantee of superior economic position. ”

“ The commercial space launch policy recognizes the many benefits which a commercial space launch industry provides to the United States. It balances launch industry needs with those of other industries and with important national security interests, and establishes the long-term goal of a free and fair market in which U.S. industry can compete. ”

“ Foster technology development and demonstration to support future decisions on the development of next generation reusable space transportation systems that greatly reduce the cost of access to space; Encourage the cost-effective use of commercially provided U.S. products and services, to the fullest extent feasible, that meet mission requirements; and Foster the international competitiveness of the U.S. commercial space transportation industry, actively considering commercial needs and factoring them into decisions on improvements in launch facilities and launch vehicles. ”

“ The resulting economic forces are impelling domestic industry to accelerate the automation of its factories.
The space program is viewed by many as a high technology venture which predominantly makes use of computers, robot spacecraft, and other trappings of automation. In reality, NASA's activities are strongly people intensive. For example, large teams of trained technicians and scientists are required to operate a robot space probe by remote control. The same economic forces at work in the marketplace are forcing NASA to rethink its traditional way of doing business. ”

“ Just as the oceans opened up a new world for clipper ships and Yankee traders, space holds enormous potential for commerce today. The market for space transportation could surpass our capacity to develop it. Companies interested in putting payloads into space must have ready access to private sector launch services. The Department of Transportation will help an expendable launch services industry to get off the ground. We'll soon implement a number of executive initiatives, develop proposals to ease regulatory constraints, and, with NASA's help, promote private sector investment in space. ”

“ Its biggest clients - government and budget-funded agencies - rarely pay or pay late. Prices for space-related services do not reflect market realities.
According to fas.org's comprehensive survey of the Russian space industry, investment in replacement of capital assets deteriorated from 9 percent in 1998 to 0.5 percent in 1994. In the same period, costs of materials shot up 382 times, cost of hardware services went up by 172 times, while labour costs increased 82-fold. The average salary in the space industry, once a multiple of the Russian average wage, has now fallen beneath it. ”

“ The truth is, NASA has always relied on private industry to help design and build the vehicles that carry astronauts to space, from the Mercury capsule that carried John Glenn into orbit nearly 50 years ago, to the space shuttle Discovery currently orbiting overhead. By buying the services of space transportation -- rather than the vehicles themselves -- we can continue to ensure rigorous safety standards are met. ”

“ Recently, however, there have been indications that businessmen feel they will be able to conduct certain business operations and services in space.
The space frontier will inevitably increase the scale of thinking and risk taking by business. When we are dealing with [Pg 25] space, we are dealing with a technology that requires a planetary scale to stage it; decades of time to develop it; and much bigger investments to get across the threshold of economic return than is customary in business today. Business must now think in international terms, and in terms of the next business generation. ”

“ Economics. Implementation of the proposed scenario, even given its strong emphasis on the utilization of space resources and automation, will require large-scale investment. The mission is designed, however, to build on existing and planned space programs Some venture capital from private individuals and corporations may be expected as the project draws closer to the point of economic payback.
The space-manufacturing mission is designed to draw less and less on terrestrial economic resources as it develops. ”

“ Finally, an economic value of extreme importance could be the ultimate role of the space program in modifying the threat to labor which is inherent in automation and disarmament. Space exploration, opening up new and profitable vistas, could take up much of the slack thus imposed and do it at a higher and more intellectual job level.
Automation, as we know, is already in the process. In agriculture alone it has bitten deeply into the laboring force and yet produces greater crops than ever. ”

“ At the same time, after decades of neglect, we will increase investment -- right away -- in other groundbreaking technologies that will allow astronauts to reach space sooner and more often, to travel farther and faster for less cost, and to live and work in space for longer periods of time more safely. ”

“ Besides reducing environmental pollution hazards and increasing world interdependence, the advanced SMF in the long term will undoubtedly have major impacts on private enterprise, labor, industrial capacity, and social conditions in general. While expanded capacity and increased product variety seem likely to be a positive contribution, competition for markets and jobs must certainly be a concern. Careful planning plus a very gradual evolution will help to minimize disruption. A system for equitable involvement of private enterprise in space manufacturing must be devised. ”

“ It will accelerate the design and development of improved automated assembly and processing techniques applicable to the problems of achieving increased Earth-based manufacturing productivity. By establishing an automated, growing, selfreplicating, multipurpose, multiproduct lunar manufacturing facility, NASA capacity for space exploration and research can be enormously expanded and permanently enhanced with only modest continuing expenditures. ”