Financing the New Space Industry Breaking Free of Gravity and Government Support /

• Main Author: McCurdy, Howard E. (Author, http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/relators/aut)
• Corporate Author: SpringerLink (Online service)
• Format: Electronic eBook
• Language: English
• Published: Cham : Springer International Publishing : Imprint: Palgrave Pivot, 2019.
• Edition: 1st ed. 2019.
• Series: Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology
• Subjects: History.; United States-History.; Finance-History.; Space sciences.; History of Science.; US History.; Financial History.; Space Sciences (including Extraterrestrial Physics, Space Exploration and Astronautics).
• Physical Description: X, 122 p. 6 illus. in color. online resource.
• ISBN: 9783030322922
• DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-32292-2

This Palgrave Pivot investigates the efforts of five aerospace companies-SpaceX, Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic, Orbital Sciences, and the Boeing Company-to launch their entry into the field of commercial space transportation. Can private sector firms raise enough capital to end the usual dependence on government funding? What can historical examples of other large-scale transportation initiatives, such as the first transcontinental railway and the first commercial jetliner, teach us about the prospects of commercial space flight? As Howard E. McCurdy shows, commercializing space is a great experiment, the outcome of which will depend on whether new space entrepreneurs can attract support from a variety of traditional and nontraditional sources.