![]() The total development cost of Falcon 1 was approximately US$90 million to US$100 million. The Falcon 1 was an expendable two-stage-to-orbit small-lift launch vehicle. SpaceX developed its first orbital launch vehicle, the Falcon 1, with internal funding. The first successful Falcon 1 launch in September 2008 2005–2009: Falcon 1 and first orbital launches Musk has stated that one of his goals with SpaceX is to decrease the cost and improve the reliability of access to space, ultimately by a factor of ten. Musk personally interviewed and approved all of SpaceX's early employees. By November 2005, the company had 160 employees. Early SpaceX employees such as Tom Mueller (CTO), Gwynne Shotwell (COO) and Chris Thompson (VP of Operations) came from neighboring TRW and Boeing corporations following the cancellation of the Brilliant Pebbles program. SpaceX was first headquartered in a warehouse in El Segundo, California. Mueller agreed to work for Musk, and thus SpaceX was born. Musk approached rocket engineer Tom Mueller (later SpaceX's CTO of propulsion) and invited him to become his business partner. In early 2002, Musk started to look for staff for his new space company, soon to be named SpaceX. Griffin would later be appointed NASA administrator and award SpaceX a $396 million contract in 2006 before SpaceX had flown a rocket. By applying vertical integration, using cheap commercial off-the-shelf components when possible, and adopting the modular approach of modern software engineering, Musk believed SpaceX could significantly cut launch price. On the flight home Musk announced that he could start a company to build the affordable rockets they needed instead. When Musk returned to Moscow, Russia, with Michael Griffin (who led the CIA's venture capital arm In-Q-Tel ), they found the Russians increasingly unreceptive. ![]() However two months later, the United States withdrew from the ABM Treaty and created the Missile Defense Agency, increasing tensions with Russia and generating new strategic interest for rapid and re-usable launch capability similar to the DC-X. Musk initially attempted to acquire a Dnepr ICBM for the project through Russian contacts from Jim Cantrell. : 30–31 He was offered a plenary talk at their convention where he announced Mars Oasis, a project to land a miniature experimental greenhouse and grow plants on Mars, to revive public interest in space exploration. In early 2001, Elon Musk donated $100,000 to the Mars Society and joined its board of directors for a short time. See also: List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches 2001–2004: Founding In addition, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets have been flown and landed over one hundred times. These include making the first privately developed liquid-propellant rocket that reached orbit, the first private company to launch, orbit, and recover a spacecraft, the first private company to send a spacecraft to the International Space Station, the first to achieve vertical propulsive landing of an orbital rocket booster, the first to reuse such a booster, and the first private company to send astronauts to orbit and to the International Space Station. SpaceX has made several achievements in space exploration. It will have the highest payload capacity of any orbital rocket ever built on its debut, which is scheduled for early 2023 pending a launch license. It is intended to become SpaceX's primary orbital vehicle once operational, supplanting the existing Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy, and Dragon fleet. The company is also developing Starship, a privately funded, fully reusable, super heavy-lift launch system for interplanetary and orbital spaceflight. In January 2020, the Starlink constellation became the largest satellite constellation ever launched, and as of December 2022 comprises over 3,300 small satellites in orbit. SpaceX is developing a satellite internet constellation named Starlink to provide commercial internet service. The company manufactures the Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy, and Starship launch vehicles, several rocket engines, Cargo Dragon and Crew Dragon spacecraft, and Starlink communications satellites. ![]() It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the stated goal of reducing space transportation costs to enable the colonization of Mars. ( SpaceX) is an American spacecraft manufacturer, launcher, and a satellite communications corporation headquartered in Hawthorne, California.
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