TechCrunch Space: Building (and testing) for the future

Hello and welcome back to TechCrunch Space. It’s becoming a habit to open each TechCrunch Space newsletter with a bit of an update on Boeing’s Starliner mission, so bear with me. Per NASA officials, the spacecraft will now return its two-person crew to Earth no earlier than June 26, instead of the originally planned date […]

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SpaceX debuts portable Starlink Mini for $599

SpaceX unveiled Starlink Mini, a more portable version of its satellite internet product that is small enough to fit inside a backpack.  Early Starlink customers were invited to purchase the Starlink Mini kit for $599, according to an invitation sent to customers and viewed by TechCrunch. That’s $100 more than the standard Starlink kit. They […]

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Gravitics prepares a testing gauntlet for a new generation of giant spacecraft

The space industry is all abuzz about how SpaceX’s Starship, Blue Origin’s New Glenn, and other heavy-lift rockets will change just about everything. One likely consequence is that spacecraft will get bigger — much bigger — as engineers work outside the constraints of low mass requirements.  There’s one problem: the current testing regime for spacecraft […]

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Boeing’s Starliner capsule took astronauts to space — now it needs to bring them back

The delays are not over for Boeing’s Starliner capsule. After years of delays, the aerospace giant finally launched the spacecraft earlier this month, but the two-person crew is currently due to spend more than double the planned amount of time in space due to continuing technical issues on orbit.  On Tuesday, NASA and Boeing officials […]

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Announcing the agenda for the Space Stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024

We’re out-of-this-world excited to announce that we’ve added a dedicated Space Stage to TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. It joins Fintech, SaaS and AI as the other industry-focused stages — all under one big roof. And we’re excited to share we’ll be hosting a pitch competition this year “The Space Challenge, powered by Aerospace” as part of […]

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Internal SpaceX documents show the sweet stock deals offered to investors like a16z, Gigafund

Like many highly valued startups, SpaceX sometimes allows its employees to cash out some of their shares by selling to company-authorized outside investors. TechCrunch has gotten a peek at an internal SpaceX document about such a tender offer from May 2022. Musk posted on X last month that SpaceX holds such sales for employees about […]

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Rocket Lab’s Peter Beck on reshaping the space economy at Disrupt 2024

The future of the space industry may look a lot like its past, or so believes Peter Beck, founder and CEO of Rocket Lab. At TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 in San Francisco, he’ll be explaining how full-service, vertically integrated space companies will (again) be the big winners of this evolving space economy. Rocket Lab was started […]

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TechCrunch Space: A new era for human spaceflight research

Hello and welcome back to TechCrunch Space. We’ll have to wait a little longer for the return of Boeing’s Starliner capsule from the International Space Station — the capsule and its two astronauts will stay at the station for twice as much time as originally planned, to give mission operators additional time to conduct tests […]

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Astroscale’s space junk inspection satellite snaps a close-up photo of a discarded rocket stage

Astroscale’s space junk observation satellite has moved within striking distance to a discarded rocket upper stage that’s been floating around Earth for nearly 20 years, taking close-up pictures — preliminary to actually deorbiting the object in a future mission. The company released an image captured by its satellite from a distance of just 50 meters […]

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Albedo takes Earth observation up close and personal from very low Earth orbit

Satellite imagery startup Albedo is preparing for its up close and personal debut. Albedo’s first satellite will take to orbit next spring as the company looks to turn the commercial Earth observation industry upside down with its novel approach and ultra-high resolution cameras.  The satellite, called Clarity, will hitch a ride to very low Earth […]

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