Could an Australian firm rival Elon Musk's SpaceX? | The Business | ABC NEWS
On Thursday, a two week launch window will open for an Australian company hoping to take one giant leap forward in the nation’s sovereign space capabilities.
From the Bowen region in far north Queensland, Gilmore Space Technologies will try to launch a rocket into orbit – a feat not accomplished in Australia for about 50 years.
When asked why Australia’s isn’t already sending rockets into orbit, Gilmour Space Technologies chief executive, Adam Gilmour says Australia still puts up a lot of barriers, saying he’s had a lot of people, including the government and Department of Defence, tell him he’s crazy. But he said: “I spent a lot of time working overseas, and the rest of the world doesn’t have those barriers. They just get on with it. And so when I decided I wanted to do this, I didn’t care that it hadn’t been done before. I just knew it was possible. A lot of other countries have done it before, so I just said, Let’s do it.”
As for whether he’s competing with Elon Musk’s Space X, Mr Gilmour says while they are operating in the same business, they are operating in different market segments. “SpaceX is like an A380 that goes from one capital city of a country to another capital city of a country and nowhere else… But spaces like the Earth, you want to go to other places, you want to go from Sydney to Melbourne, from Brisbane to Darwin, etc. So you need smaller jets, and so we’re the version of the smaller jet. So we’re not really competing directly with SpaceX at all.”
His rocket will contain a camera and a jar of Vegemite.
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