(James Vaughan/Getty Images) |
Beachfront hotel views < Earthfront hotel views |
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55 years ago tomorrow, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first people to walk on the moon. In honor of the Apollo 11 landing, we whipped up a Snacks special edition on the business of space, from floating hotels to galactic Wi-Fi. One small step for humans, one giant leap for market anxiety: the VIX — Wall Street's "fear gauge" index — soared to its highest level since April yesterday after a market sell-off. US weekly jobless claims jumped to the highest level of the year, stoking econ worries. 🌌 Quiz the sky: The Snacks Seven quiz tests how closely you've been reading this week's biz stories in our newsletters (including today's). Here's the first Q: |
- Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica said it'd buy which streetwear brand for $1.5B? (Check your answer.)
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Vacation-ifying space… As space tourism companies work toward a future where spring breaks happen near Saturn, joy flights are already operational. The superrich are jetting off to the high stratosphere and completing astronaut training to visit the International Space Station. Space tourism's next horizon? Full-on space vacays. One startup, Above: Space Development, is working on building two luxury space-station hotels (picture: huge floating rings), which it says could be completed within five years of securing $1B+ in funding. Meantime, Hilton made a deal to operate a space hotel with a planned 2027 launch. Billionaires in space… Unlike in other areas of the space biz (which you'll read about in a sec), Elon Musk's SpaceX is one of interstellar tourism's smaller players. Just a handful of civilians have flown on its rocket to the ISS on a single trip that reportedly cost $55M per seat. Meanwhile, 32 folks have gone intergalactic on Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin rockets (one tourist paid $28M at a charity auction) and 55 have gone anti-gravity on up-to-$450K space-skimming rides with Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic. Startups not owned by famous billionaires are also looking skyward, like Halo Space, which aims to offer stratospheric balloon rides for star-seekers on a budget (still $50K to $200K). It's gonna be a long, long time… until you use a moon emoji as your Slack away message. Some experts have predicted that global space tourism could hit $1.7B in 2027. But considering how expensive each jaunt toward Jupiter costs, it may not be a big industry — at least not until mid-century, when some predict space cos could make the Jetsons' lifestyle more affordable. |
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Fast Food's Future = Kitchen AI |
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Fast Food's Future = Kitchen AI |
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Looks like a star... actually a Starlink. The satellite-launch industry — which puts machines into space to orbit planets including the Earth — is entering its startup era. For decades, satellite tech has been used for everything from gov't surveillance and GPS to weather-pattern tracking and boosting TV signals. But uses are growing: SpaceX's Starlink satellites aim to provide internet to rural areas and have been used to provide high-speed Wi-Fi on tens of thousands of flights for carriers like Hawaiian Airlines and Qatar Airways. Last year, T-Mobile teamed up with SpaceX to launch the first "direct to cell" satellites designed to supercharge cell coverage from space. Space startup funding more than doubled in Q1 as rising geopolitical tensions drove governments to ramp up satellite surveillance (think: monitoring borders). Players in this space… There are nearly 10K satellites estimated to be orbiting Earth, and NASA says private companies will play a growing role in launches. Musk's Starlink is the biggest player by far, with 6K+ satellites orbiting 342 miles above Earth. SpaceX plans to launch 144 Falcon rocket missions this year, largely to deploy more internet-beaming satellites. Rivals are picking up speed too: Rocket Lab has launched 180+ satellites, providing internet access to remote locations for services like forest-fire detection. And Amazon's Project Kuiper has been testing launches to reach its goal of connecting 3.2K satellites that offer space-based internet. To infinity… As satellite demand grows, so have investments into tech that can cut launch costs (like: 3D printed rocket parts, smaller satellites). Now companies that used to pay hundreds of thousands per launch can pay a fraction of the price. Experts say satellite launches could reach 2.8K a year (or 8/day) by 2032. But some scientists fear that Starlink's supersonic growth could interfere with universe observations and spaceflight safety. Last week, a SpaceX rocket malfunctioned, dropping 20 Starlink satellites into the wrong orbit. |
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The final frontier… In February, Intuitive Machines' Odysseus lander — carrying experiments for NASA — became the first US spacecraft to land on the moon since 1972 (and the first privately built spacecraft to do so). NASA paid the company $118M for the lift. The agency has big plans including a trip around the moon, a probe of Jupiter's moon Europa, and a crewed lunar landing set for fall 2026. NASA is increasingly relying on partnerships with private companies to complete its missions, believing that US gov't funding alone won't be enough to get pricey jobs done. NASA's private redshirts… Last year, NASA paid out ~$15B to private contractors including Musk's SpaceX (which earned about $2.3B from the agency), Boeing ($1.6B), Northrop Grumman ($1.3B), and Lockheed Martin ($1.2B). Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin received about $440M from the agency, though it also locked down a $3.4B NASA contract to build a spacecraft that will fly astronauts to and from the moon under the Artemis program. SpaceX, which won an $840M+ contract last month to decommission the ISS, received a similar moon landing contract in 2021. That'll give the US more options for lunar-surface exploration. Exploring the cosmos… ain't cheap. Earlier this month, Congress proposed a NASA budget roughly $200M below the amount requested by the White House. But on the bright side for NASA and its private partners, the Artemis program (that'll return astronauts to the moon) will still get its requested $7.6B. |
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- Limbo: Two NASA astronauts may be stuck on the ISS until August, after problems with Boeing's Starliner capsule. Starliner was $1.5B+ over budget and years behind schedule when it launched its crewed flight over a month ago.
- TakeTwo: "Fly Me to the Moon," an Apollo 11-inspired rom-com starring ScarJo and Channing Tatum, failed to blast off at the box office. It reportedly pulled in $10M in its opening weekend on a $100M budget.
- Trashy: Rockets keep falling back to Earth, crashing into populated areas and putting lives at risk. The amount of space junk is increasing, and millions of pieces of trash orbit Earth at 17K mph.
- Moonshot: Moon-mining startup Interlune got a $348K NASA grant to test tech to extract helium-3 (which could power fusion reactors) from the lunar surface. Other companies are developing asteroid-mining tech.
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- WNBA All-Star Weekend begins
- Earnings expected from Halliburton, Fifth Third Bancorp, Schlumberger, American Express, SLB, Autoliv, and Travelers Cos.
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Authors of this Snacks own shares of: Amazon and Rocket Lab |
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Sherwood Media, LLC produces fresh and unique perspectives on topical financial news and is a fully owned subsidiary of Robinhood Markets, Inc., and any views expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of any other Robinhood affiliate... See more |
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