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(cheerful music)
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- I am Torsten Hoffmann,
an award-winning filmmaker,
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entrepreneur, and techno-optimist.
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You're gonna see it go over my shoulder.
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I'm really into emerging technologies
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and how a trillion dollar industries
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are forming around them.
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Right now the space
sector is going ballistic.
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(rocker roars)
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And trust me, it's way
bigger than Musk and Bezos.
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(rocket zooming)
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- There were headlines,
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new era private industry
is gonna lead the way.
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(crowd cheers)
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No, they're not.
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- [Torsten] So allow me to
whirl you around the world,
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catapult you into orbit,
and hurl you through space.
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You ready?
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- [Astronaut] Ten.
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- [Torsten] This space renaissance
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isn't just fueled by governments.
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Hundreds of companies are
competing for fame and fortune.
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- SpaceX were the first private company
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to put a satellite in orbit.
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We were the second.
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- [Astronaut] Nine.
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- Oh, my god.
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- My mommy's gonna be an astronaut.
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- [Torsten] Meet the next
generation of astronauts,
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the new faces of new space.
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So you're literally a rocket scientist.
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- Yeah. (laughs)
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- [Astronaut] Eight.
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- A cube set can be as small as this.
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- Launching into space for,
say, $100,000 or $200,000.
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- So, why is this guy spending 2 billion
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on three huge satellites?
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Okay, one question, are you crazy?
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- No. (laughs)
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- [Astronaut] Seven.
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- [Torsten] New constellations
are filling the skies.
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- This is creating a trillion
dollar market opportunity.
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And the list is really endless.
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- [Torsten] Tracking climate change
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and tackling geopolitics.
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- [Astronaut] Six.
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- I think it will change
the political calculus
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going forward if everyone gets to know
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that these things aren't gonna
be possible to hide anymore.
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- [Astronaut] Five.
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- [Torsten] Dying
satellites can now be saved.
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- I deorbited dozens of spacecraft.
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But we don't have to do that anymore.
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- We don't have the right to make mistakes
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because it would be fatal.
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- [Torsten] But debris
puts it all in danger.
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- This is kind of scary to
think about something like this
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reentering and like maybe
hitting a populated area.
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- [Astronaut] Four.
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- [Torsten] In our future,
asteroid mining is a thing.
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- The amount of platinum
group metals out there
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is in the trillions of dollars.
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- [Astronaut] Three.
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- Maybe someone is
already building a space hotel
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like the one I read about as a kid.
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- This is happening.
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We are building a space station.
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- [Astronaut] Two.
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- And we use the
inedible part of the plants
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to feed the insects
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which create the
substrate for the mushroom.
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- My role and purpose is to
help save the DNA of Earth
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and spread light to the stars.
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- [Astronaut] One.
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- If the public does
not see the value of this,
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immediately I will work
to ensure that they do.
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- Roger that.
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Let's meet those turning
science fiction into science fact.
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(upbeat music)
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(bright music)
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(elevator dings)
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A little space history,
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the first rockets were
built in Hitler's Germany,
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but let's not talk about
Operation Paperclip here.
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The Russians were
leading the early space race.
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Sputnik, the first object in orbit.
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Scary.
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Yay, gold medal.
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Sputnik II had the first creature in space
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like (indistinct) space dock.
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Sadly, she gave her life.
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Then Yuri, the first man
in orbit, a hundred minutes.
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Alexei did the first space walk.
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And then Valentina,
the first woman in space,
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for three full days.
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The Soviets sent this little sturdy guy,
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hi, Sheldon, around the moon.
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And he made it back safely.
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- Ah, comrade.
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- Seriously guys, the
Russians were killing it.
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But then, President JFK
mobilized 400,000 Americans.
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- But it will be done.
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- And a lot of taxpayer money
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and made the ultimate moonshot possible.
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The Apollo board computers
had less memory power
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than Shelly's birthday card.
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Yes, back then the future was bright.
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We actually built nuclear
reactors and supersonic jets.
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And the airline PanAm
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even took reservations
for tickets to the moon.
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No kidding.
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Take five.
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It's amazing to me that it
took humanity only 12 years
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from a small Russian ball
of steel in low Earth orbit
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to 12 Americans with, well, balls of steel
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to walk on the moon.
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12 years.
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That's faster than getting a permit
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for a new bridge in my town today.
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But after the achievements of Apollo,
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some say NASA lost its thrust.
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Per kilogram of payload,
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the space shuttle of the 1980s
was 10 times more expensive
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and less reliable than
the rockets from the 1960s.
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We are skipping ahead
a few history chapters,
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but eventually it was
high time for competition
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from the private sector.
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Jeff Bezos was inspired by
NFI legend, Robert Heinlein.
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Maybe when he grows up,
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he can build his own
rockets and go to space.
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Back in 2000, Bezos founded
and fully funded Blue Origin.
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And 21 years later, his
dream finally came through.
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Some critics say that the
billionaire's Blue moves too slow.
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Oh, hi, Shelly, buddy.
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Is that you?
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Well, if Bezos is the tortoise,
then this guy is the hare.
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♪ Elon Musk Musk Musk ♪
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Love him or hate him,
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SpaceX reached orbit in
fast and furious fashion,
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only six years after Elon Musk founded
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and funded it in 2002.
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Legends of science
fiction like Isaac Asimov
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were foundational to Elon Musk as a kid.
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Maybe humanity could be
saved on a galactic scale.
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♪ Ironman is just a clown boy. ♪
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Yep, the billionaires sure
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are getting a lot of heat from the media.
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♪ Tech unicorns ♪
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♪ But why'd you flame the union ♪
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♪ One man saving humanity ♪
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♪ Come on that's just insanity ♪
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- Cut it out guys.
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This is a serious documentary.
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We don't care about
drama and all this gossip.
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(glass tinkling) Oops.
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Window broke again.
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Sorry, Elon.
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(fire blazes)
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- Ouch.
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♪ Tunnel support really regulates ♪
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♪ (indistinct) till the
energy storing out of space ♪
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♪ Exploring flames and throwing drinks ♪
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♪ (indistinct) poke and go
smoking with Joe Rogan ♪
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- Ah, stop it.
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That's our TikTok video.
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- Three, two, one.
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- [Torsten] Seriously though,
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the new space parents were early,
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piling billions into
this space 20 years ago.
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Long before there was a market,
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launch was dominated by
the government and military.
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Slowly, other private initiatives took off.
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- My name is Anousheh Ansari
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and I'm CEO of XPRIZE Foundation.
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- [Torsten] In 2004,
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Dr. Ansari funded the XPRIZE competition
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to build a spaceship, fly three passengers
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a hundred kilometers to
the edge of space, and return.
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Twice in two weeks without
a dime of government support.
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- 2016, from 11 countries competed,
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a hundred million dollars
was spent by the teams
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to win the $10 million prize.
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And most people thought it's impossible,
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they called us crazy.
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A lot of people told me that
you're gonna get people killed.
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What are you doing?
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And to me, it just,
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it was, you know, a risk worth taking
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because it was about future of humanity.
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- [Torsten] The winning team was financed
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by billionaire, Microsoft
co-founder, Paul Allen,
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and acquired by debonair
billionaire, Sir Richard Branson,
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who quickly christen it Virgin Galactic.
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We'll get to space travel in a minute.
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The point here is that
competition leads to dropping costs.
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Today there are hundreds of
competing rocket companies
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hoping to reach escape velocity,
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but SpaceX towers over them all.
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That one company controlled
by a single singular man
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hauls five times more payload
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than all other countries
and companies combined.
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Ha, and now all eyes
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are on Elon's even bigger
fricking rocket, Starship.
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(gentle music)
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Meanwhile, NASA is back on the launch pad,
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the new mega rocket,
SLS, destined for the moon.
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- [Announcer] And lift off of Artemis I.
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- [Torsten] Uses leftover engines
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from the space shuttle program.
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But with each launch,
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two of them are thrown away into the ocean.
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Imagine discarding an
airplane after each flight.
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That's why this version of SLS
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can only fly a total of eight times.
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- [Reporter] And then so now we're seeing
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some more of that
video of the external tank.
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- [Torsten] No wonder launch
costs are 40 times higher
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than what private rocket
companies advertise
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because the real key for
lower cost is reusability.
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Since first landing boosters in 2015,
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SpaceX has done it hundreds of times
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and offers the cheapest access to orbit.
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(bright music)
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- SpaceX we're the first private company
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to put a satellite on orbit.
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We were the second.
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You know, we are often asked like,
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who do we see as our competitors?
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And really, it's only SpaceX
if we're honest about it.
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- [Torsten] Peter didn't go to university
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and instead cut his
teeth building jet packs
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and bicycles with rocket propulsion.
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He found a rocket lab in
the most unlikely of places.
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New Zealand.
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His home country lacks
robust venture capital,
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and don't they have
strong regulations there?
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That's right.
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Can you hear me guys?
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- Yeah, I can hear you fine, Torsten.
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- [Torsten] I do also hear sometimes
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a little bit of criticism
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about the fossil fuels
that are being burned.
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- We have more carbon emissions
from the diesel generators
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at the launch site than we
actually do from the rocket.
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But like I say, one launch for us
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is the equivalent of going
from LA to San Francisco.
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And I don't know how many hundred flights
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there are a week, but tremendous number.
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- Rocket Lab has an impressive track record
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and a stellar reputation but...
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That's what you guys are doing even better
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if a company like SpaceX
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is pulling up 200,000 kilograms a quarter.
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- Yeah, no, that's a fair question.
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And, you know, the reality is,
as I mentioned to you before,
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like if you've got...
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You have to get a satellite
to a particular destination
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for it to be commercial.
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So, piling up, you know, a
hundred tons of satellites
260
00:10:12,400 --> 00:10:14,800
and dumping them all out of one spot
261
00:10:14,880 --> 00:10:16,520
doesn't make a business.
262
00:10:16,560 --> 00:10:18,760
It's kind of got all of the
advantages and disadvantages
263
00:10:18,800 --> 00:10:19,600
of riding a bus.
264
00:10:19,640 --> 00:10:22,920
So, you know, you don't
get your schedule certainty.
265
00:10:22,960 --> 00:10:24,280
The bus arrives when it arrives
266
00:10:24,320 --> 00:10:25,600
and it leaves when it leaves.
267
00:10:25,640 --> 00:10:28,360
You might be sitting beside someone smelly,
268
00:10:28,400 --> 00:10:29,920
but it's cheap.
269
00:10:29,960 --> 00:10:30,760
- [Torsten] Right.
270
00:10:30,800 --> 00:10:33,560
So you won't see Peter
taking the bus anytime soon.
271
00:10:33,600 --> 00:10:36,360
His company's like a white
glove limousine service.
272
00:10:36,400 --> 00:10:39,000
Personally, I am more of an Uber guy.
273
00:10:39,040 --> 00:10:40,800
- We are kind of Uber in space,
274
00:10:40,840 --> 00:10:44,240
just a little bit more complicated.
275
00:10:44,280 --> 00:10:48,040
For example, when Falcon 9
delivers a bunch of satellites
276
00:10:48,080 --> 00:10:49,560
to the target orbit,
277
00:10:49,600 --> 00:10:52,920
Falcon 9 deploys all
these satellites into space.
278
00:10:52,960 --> 00:10:55,600
But this specific orbit might not be ideal
279
00:10:55,640 --> 00:10:57,760
for the small side customer.
280
00:10:57,840 --> 00:11:01,240
So we need to use our OTV
to take all these satellites
281
00:11:01,280 --> 00:11:03,760
to their custom destinations.
282
00:11:03,840 --> 00:11:06,960
We've launched over
100 satellites with SpaceX
283
00:11:07,040 --> 00:11:09,400
over the last couple of years,
284
00:11:09,440 --> 00:11:11,520
but we are open to work with everyone.
285
00:11:11,560 --> 00:11:14,200
And a lot of emerging players
286
00:11:14,280 --> 00:11:16,240
will enter this field very soon,
287
00:11:16,280 --> 00:11:18,720
and we can't wait to
launch with all of them.
288
00:11:20,600 --> 00:11:23,400
I'm in charge of the commercial
success of the company
289
00:11:23,440 --> 00:11:28,080
of like sales, bidding our
contracts with our customers,
290
00:11:28,120 --> 00:11:30,360
with our launch vehicle providers.
291
00:11:31,600 --> 00:11:34,360
Yeah, surprisingly, we
are a self-funded company
292
00:11:34,400 --> 00:11:36,720
and we've been profitable from day one,
293
00:11:36,760 --> 00:11:40,160
which is like a very unique
case for the industry.
294
00:11:40,200 --> 00:11:41,800
- [Torsten] This German
company has deployed
295
00:11:41,840 --> 00:11:43,480
more than 350 satellites
296
00:11:43,560 --> 00:11:46,120
for over 60 international customers.
297
00:11:46,160 --> 00:11:48,160
The wait time for Exolaunch's rideshare
298
00:11:48,240 --> 00:11:50,440
lifting you to low Earth orbit, LEO,
299
00:11:50,480 --> 00:11:53,320
can be as fast as four to six months.
300
00:11:53,360 --> 00:11:54,640
But time is money.
301
00:11:54,720 --> 00:11:55,840
So if you're in a hurry,
302
00:11:55,880 --> 00:11:57,600
there's an express from Texas.
303
00:11:58,480 --> 00:12:00,160
- I'd always been making engine sections,
304
00:12:00,240 --> 00:12:01,240
I'd been building engines,
305
00:12:01,320 --> 00:12:02,440
I'd been integrating vehicles,
306
00:12:02,520 --> 00:12:04,880
but I'd never made fire.
307
00:12:04,920 --> 00:12:06,280
And that was the next step for me,
308
00:12:06,360 --> 00:12:09,480
was to be the mother
of rockets to make fire.
309
00:12:09,520 --> 00:12:11,640
- [Torsten] The US Space
Force wanted to demonstrate
310
00:12:11,680 --> 00:12:15,680
the capability of launching
payload on short notice.
311
00:12:15,720 --> 00:12:17,440
- I got a phone call and it said,
312
00:12:17,480 --> 00:12:19,040
"You are launching to this orbit,"
313
00:12:19,080 --> 00:12:20,640
which we had not known before.
314
00:12:20,680 --> 00:12:22,120
"Go ahead and get ready."
315
00:12:22,200 --> 00:12:24,520
In 24 hours, you have to launch a rocket
316
00:12:24,600 --> 00:12:26,800
exactly in this three-minute window.
317
00:12:26,880 --> 00:12:29,000
So it's actually more
like a ten-second window,
318
00:12:29,040 --> 00:12:30,000
24 hours out.
319
00:12:30,040 --> 00:12:32,320
- Well when they pointed at us and said go,
320
00:12:33,760 --> 00:12:36,280
we were able to get done in 24 hours
321
00:12:36,360 --> 00:12:40,280
what previously had never
been done faster than 21 days.
322
00:12:40,320 --> 00:12:43,080
This company, Firefly, we did that.
323
00:12:43,120 --> 00:12:46,600
- So there's nothing both more
exciting and more terrifying
324
00:12:46,640 --> 00:12:48,800
than when the rocket leaves the pad
325
00:12:48,840 --> 00:12:51,160
and she's moving and
you're not just testing,
326
00:12:51,200 --> 00:12:52,560
she's actually lifting off.
327
00:12:57,520 --> 00:13:01,520
(crowd cheering and applauding)
328
00:13:04,080 --> 00:13:07,360
(gentle music)
329
00:13:07,440 --> 00:13:09,840
- [Torsten] The most
precious payload is people.
330
00:13:11,280 --> 00:13:14,600
Someone beat the billionaires
to space by 15 years.
331
00:13:18,120 --> 00:13:21,160
- I grew up in Iran wanting
to become an astronaut.
332
00:13:22,440 --> 00:13:24,920
As a young girl, becoming an astronaut,
333
00:13:24,960 --> 00:13:26,520
of course, was a big dream for me,
334
00:13:26,560 --> 00:13:30,160
but my parents thought it's impossible.
335
00:13:30,240 --> 00:13:32,120
I sort of hung on to that dream
336
00:13:32,160 --> 00:13:34,480
and wanted to make it come true.
337
00:13:34,560 --> 00:13:37,200
- Dr. Ansari trained as a Soyuz astronaut.
338
00:13:37,240 --> 00:13:38,520
And for a few million dollars,
339
00:13:38,560 --> 00:13:40,560
bought herself a ticket to ride.
340
00:13:40,600 --> 00:13:43,240
She spent a full nine days aboard the ISS.
341
00:13:43,320 --> 00:13:47,000
That's 140 times around the
planet, fulfilling her dream.
342
00:13:51,360 --> 00:13:53,760
These new companies
and an influx of investment
343
00:13:53,800 --> 00:13:56,320
created modern day space tourism.
344
00:13:56,360 --> 00:13:58,400
You can follow it on a screen near you.
345
00:13:58,440 --> 00:14:00,160
Even Captain Kirk was beamed up.
346
00:14:01,720 --> 00:14:02,960
- What you have given me
347
00:14:04,600 --> 00:14:07,600
is the most profound
experience (indistinct).
348
00:14:09,440 --> 00:14:10,520
- [Torsten] Whether you think billionaires
349
00:14:10,560 --> 00:14:13,200
should ascend to the heavens or go to hell.
350
00:14:13,240 --> 00:14:15,800
- Maybe Bezos shouldn't
be allowed to return to Earth.
351
00:14:15,840 --> 00:14:16,680
- [Torsten] Their fed wallets
352
00:14:16,720 --> 00:14:19,600
have kicked open space
trouble for more of us,
353
00:14:19,680 --> 00:14:21,560
and some are really into it.
354
00:14:21,600 --> 00:14:23,640
My friend Dylan, a space entrepreneur
355
00:14:23,680 --> 00:14:25,960
and a leading figure in
the new space economy,
356
00:14:26,000 --> 00:14:28,000
was one of the first to go with Blue.
357
00:14:28,080 --> 00:14:30,280
And he has an appetite for more.
358
00:14:30,320 --> 00:14:32,200
- I'm a ticket holder on Virgin Galactic.
359
00:14:32,280 --> 00:14:36,280
I think number 642 in
line space perspectives,
360
00:14:36,360 --> 00:14:38,440
which is the high altitude
361
00:14:38,520 --> 00:14:40,680
stratospheric balloon and worldview.
362
00:14:42,880 --> 00:14:45,640
(crowd cheering)
363
00:14:46,600 --> 00:14:49,360
(rocket zooming)
364
00:14:50,840 --> 00:14:53,800
(indistinct)
365
00:14:53,880 --> 00:14:56,920
The first space investment
I made was about 2007,
366
00:14:56,960 --> 00:14:59,160
which was very early for this industry.
367
00:14:59,200 --> 00:15:01,760
And my friends at the time in finance
368
00:15:01,800 --> 00:15:02,920
were sort of snickering.
369
00:15:03,000 --> 00:15:04,800
You know, you're
investing in asteroid mining
370
00:15:04,840 --> 00:15:06,200
and all these crazy ideas.
371
00:15:06,240 --> 00:15:08,560
And, of course, those same
friends now call me today
372
00:15:08,640 --> 00:15:10,360
for investment, advice, and tips,
373
00:15:10,440 --> 00:15:12,560
which I think is hilarious.
374
00:15:12,600 --> 00:15:14,440
- I had an opportunity just coincidentally
375
00:15:14,480 --> 00:15:18,480
to dive to the Mariana
Trench, to the Challenger deep,
376
00:15:19,320 --> 00:15:21,880
which is something I don't
think you can say no to.
377
00:15:23,040 --> 00:15:25,760
We actually went to a
part of the Mariana Trench
378
00:15:25,800 --> 00:15:27,400
that no humans had ever been to.
379
00:15:31,200 --> 00:15:32,880
Wow, look at that.
380
00:15:32,920 --> 00:15:35,440
And so it was like
exploring another planet.
381
00:15:39,000 --> 00:15:40,360
- [Torsten] Astronauts often describe
382
00:15:40,400 --> 00:15:42,480
a profound moment of awe.
383
00:15:42,520 --> 00:15:45,280
Frank White dubbed it the overview effect.
384
00:15:45,320 --> 00:15:47,200
So that others can experience it,
385
00:15:47,280 --> 00:15:50,160
Dylan founded the
nonprofit Space for Humanity,
386
00:15:50,200 --> 00:15:52,280
which aims to democratize access to space
387
00:15:52,320 --> 00:15:53,760
by giving tickets to those
388
00:15:53,800 --> 00:15:55,680
who could otherwise not afford it.
389
00:15:56,560 --> 00:15:58,720
- [Dylan] So it was really
founded around this idea
390
00:15:58,760 --> 00:16:02,320
of getting citizens to space
but for the benefit of Earth.
391
00:16:04,320 --> 00:16:06,960
Everyone seems to be profoundly
impacted by this experience.
392
00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:08,280
I know I was.
393
00:16:08,320 --> 00:16:09,800
I think you'd come back a changed human.
394
00:16:09,840 --> 00:16:11,800
I think you'd come back a better human.
395
00:16:17,360 --> 00:16:18,920
So how do you change people's perspective?
396
00:16:18,960 --> 00:16:21,760
You get as many people as you can to space.
397
00:16:21,840 --> 00:16:24,920
(upbeat music)
398
00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:27,280
- [Torsten] I really wanted
to talk to Space for Humanity's
399
00:16:27,360 --> 00:16:28,960
first citizen astronauts.
400
00:16:29,000 --> 00:16:31,200
So we crashed Dylan's birthday party
401
00:16:31,240 --> 00:16:33,160
and set up shop in the corner office.
402
00:16:35,400 --> 00:16:39,080
- I've dreamt of the moment
when we get to tell someone
403
00:16:39,120 --> 00:16:41,440
that they're gonna be
our first citizen astronaut.
404
00:16:41,480 --> 00:16:43,920
Right now is that moment, Katya,
405
00:16:43,960 --> 00:16:47,280
and you're gonna be our
citizen astronaut number one,
406
00:16:48,160 --> 00:16:50,320
and you're going to space.
407
00:16:50,360 --> 00:16:52,800
(Katya sobs)
408
00:16:54,120 --> 00:16:56,560
- Congratulations.
409
00:16:56,600 --> 00:16:58,040
- Oh, my god.
410
00:16:58,080 --> 00:17:00,400
My mom is gonna to freak out.
411
00:17:00,440 --> 00:17:02,440
My name is Katya Echazarreta.
412
00:17:02,480 --> 00:17:04,720
I am an electrical engineer.
413
00:17:04,760 --> 00:17:06,280
- [Torsten] So you're
literally a rocket scientist?
414
00:17:06,360 --> 00:17:07,160
- Yeah.
415
00:17:08,640 --> 00:17:10,800
(camera shutter clicks)
416
00:17:10,840 --> 00:17:13,720
I am a citizen astronaut
with Space for Humanity.
417
00:17:13,760 --> 00:17:14,680
And through that,
418
00:17:14,760 --> 00:17:18,800
I also became the first
Mexican-born woman in space.
419
00:17:18,840 --> 00:17:21,040
Living through that and
going through that experience
420
00:17:21,080 --> 00:17:24,280
and being able to actually see our planet.
421
00:17:26,280 --> 00:17:28,320
- I had what I guess you
would call an epiphany.
422
00:17:28,360 --> 00:17:29,800
- Oh my... - Hello.
423
00:17:29,840 --> 00:17:31,360
The Earth is a whole system.
424
00:17:31,400 --> 00:17:32,840
Everything's interconnected.
425
00:17:32,880 --> 00:17:34,200
We're a part of it.
426
00:17:36,000 --> 00:17:39,040
And I thought, "Okay,
it's the overview effect."
427
00:17:39,120 --> 00:17:41,360
We're all astronauts on spaceship Earth.
428
00:17:42,800 --> 00:17:43,640
- Oh my god.
429
00:17:44,760 --> 00:17:47,120
That image of the Earth,
430
00:17:50,160 --> 00:17:55,120
it was just burned
into my eyelids for days.
431
00:17:58,560 --> 00:17:59,960
- You picked?
432
00:18:00,000 --> 00:18:01,120
Good job.
433
00:18:01,200 --> 00:18:06,200
- For me, I remember that
I had just such big dreams.
434
00:18:06,440 --> 00:18:08,840
And so with my salary at McDonald's,
435
00:18:08,880 --> 00:18:10,480
with my mom cleaning houses,
436
00:18:10,560 --> 00:18:12,520
with both of us walking dogs,
437
00:18:12,560 --> 00:18:14,040
with me grading papers,
438
00:18:14,080 --> 00:18:15,920
with me doing tutoring,
439
00:18:15,960 --> 00:18:17,720
that's how we paid for a family.
440
00:18:19,680 --> 00:18:20,920
This is really important
441
00:18:20,960 --> 00:18:24,120
because for the first time in human history
442
00:18:24,160 --> 00:18:26,840
we are seeing organizations take the lead
443
00:18:26,880 --> 00:18:29,160
in this way, like Space for Humanity,
444
00:18:29,200 --> 00:18:31,880
of sending very talented
qualified individuals
445
00:18:31,920 --> 00:18:34,240
to have this space experience
446
00:18:34,320 --> 00:18:37,880
to come back empowered and
do something to help the world.
447
00:18:43,680 --> 00:18:44,440
- Oh, my god.
448
00:18:44,480 --> 00:18:45,320
Can I show you? - Yeah.
449
00:18:46,400 --> 00:18:47,960
- I am Sara Sabry.
450
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:49,960
I'm going to space.
451
00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:52,600
I am the first Egyptian
and the first African woman
452
00:18:52,640 --> 00:18:55,840
and the first Arab
woman to ever go to space.
453
00:18:55,880 --> 00:18:58,440
(camera shutter clicks)
454
00:18:58,480 --> 00:19:00,280
I have a background in
mechanical engineering,
455
00:19:00,320 --> 00:19:04,000
worked in aerodynamics on
Formula 3 car body designs,
456
00:19:04,040 --> 00:19:06,320
and then did my master's
in biomedical engineering,
457
00:19:06,360 --> 00:19:08,440
and then worked in stem cells for a while,
458
00:19:08,520 --> 00:19:10,720
and then also on robotic surgery.
459
00:19:12,240 --> 00:19:14,560
Thank you.
460
00:19:14,600 --> 00:19:15,640
Now when I look at the sky,
461
00:19:15,680 --> 00:19:18,000
it just feels very, very different.
462
00:19:18,040 --> 00:19:20,160
It's not that big anymore.
463
00:19:20,200 --> 00:19:22,120
Like, it's kind of weird to say that,
464
00:19:22,200 --> 00:19:23,640
but it feels manageable.
465
00:19:24,600 --> 00:19:25,680
It could really, really touches you.
466
00:19:25,720 --> 00:19:29,040
It's not something that
you just look at, you know?
467
00:19:29,080 --> 00:19:30,560
(indistinct)
468
00:19:30,600 --> 00:19:32,000
We're right here.
469
00:19:33,920 --> 00:19:35,440
- [Speaker] So we pay for their tickets.
470
00:19:35,480 --> 00:19:37,840
But in return, they've
gotta come back to Earth
471
00:19:37,920 --> 00:19:41,040
and do something, a
fellowship benefiting Earth
472
00:19:41,080 --> 00:19:43,880
linked to one of the UN's
sustainable development goals.
473
00:19:44,800 --> 00:19:46,480
- The more I got into this space field,
474
00:19:46,560 --> 00:19:48,280
the more I realized how inaccessible it was
475
00:19:48,360 --> 00:19:49,200
for people like me.
476
00:19:49,240 --> 00:19:50,920
I don't have a US citizenship,
477
00:19:50,960 --> 00:19:52,400
I don't have a European citizenship,
478
00:19:52,440 --> 00:19:54,040
so I decided to do something about it
479
00:19:54,120 --> 00:19:56,720
and founded a company
called Deep Space Initiative.
480
00:19:56,760 --> 00:19:57,960
We're a nonprofit.
481
00:19:58,000 --> 00:19:59,200
And we're trying to change that.
482
00:19:59,240 --> 00:20:00,880
We're trying to make space more accessible
483
00:20:00,920 --> 00:20:04,480
by providing opportunities
and education and research.
484
00:20:04,520 --> 00:20:07,080
- My next goal is to create a foundation.
485
00:20:07,120 --> 00:20:09,400
I'm currently working with
the Mexican Space Agency
486
00:20:09,480 --> 00:20:11,840
to draft up what this foundation
487
00:20:11,880 --> 00:20:14,160
is going to eventually look like
488
00:20:14,200 --> 00:20:17,240
to start supporting those individuals
489
00:20:17,280 --> 00:20:18,480
that are interested in STEM
490
00:20:18,520 --> 00:20:22,280
and interested in joining the
space industry within Mexico.
491
00:20:22,320 --> 00:20:23,640
- Hi, I am Sirisha Bandla.
492
00:20:23,680 --> 00:20:25,720
I'm the vice president
of government affairs
493
00:20:25,800 --> 00:20:28,720
and research operations at Virgin Galactic.
494
00:20:28,760 --> 00:20:31,960
Also, I'm Astronaut 004 at Virgin Galactic.
495
00:20:33,160 --> 00:20:33,960
It was amazing.
496
00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:35,560
When my name was announced on
497
00:20:35,640 --> 00:20:37,840
as a part of the Unity 22 crew,
498
00:20:37,920 --> 00:20:39,560
the amount of messages I got,
499
00:20:39,600 --> 00:20:42,040
especially from young women in India
500
00:20:42,080 --> 00:20:45,760
that just talked to me
about being an inspiration.
501
00:20:45,840 --> 00:20:48,560
And it wasn't necessarily,
I've seen you go to space,
502
00:20:48,600 --> 00:20:49,920
I'm gonna go to space now.
503
00:20:49,960 --> 00:20:52,320
It was, "Hey, it's so great
504
00:20:52,360 --> 00:20:55,080
to see someone from a community like mine
505
00:20:55,120 --> 00:20:56,680
do incredible things."
506
00:20:58,440 --> 00:21:00,280
- You're kind of a big
deal in India nowadays.
507
00:21:00,360 --> 00:21:01,120
No?
508
00:21:01,160 --> 00:21:02,800
- My Instagram definitely says so.
509
00:21:03,680 --> 00:21:04,760
- Oh, my god.
510
00:21:05,920 --> 00:21:08,200
- You can't wait till we send up lawyers
511
00:21:08,240 --> 00:21:10,600
and professional communicators
and artists to space
512
00:21:10,680 --> 00:21:13,520
'cause they'll go through
that transformative experience.
513
00:21:15,200 --> 00:21:18,120
- [Crew] Please return
to your seats and strap in.
514
00:21:18,160 --> 00:21:19,600
Approaching reentry.
515
00:21:19,680 --> 00:21:23,320
- I cannot imagine anyone's
gonna come back to Earth
516
00:21:23,360 --> 00:21:25,680
the same as they were before.
517
00:21:25,720 --> 00:21:26,720
It...
518
00:21:26,760 --> 00:21:28,640
I came back to Earth energized.
519
00:21:28,680 --> 00:21:30,840
Just completely energized.
520
00:21:36,880 --> 00:21:39,440
- [Torsten] Just look at this
new generation of astronauts.
521
00:21:39,480 --> 00:21:43,240
They're already having an
impact in India, Mexico, and Egypt
522
00:21:43,280 --> 00:21:45,520
and they're just getting started.
523
00:21:45,560 --> 00:21:46,560
- I'm Kellie Gerardi.
524
00:21:46,600 --> 00:21:47,840
I'm a citizen scientist
525
00:21:47,880 --> 00:21:50,280
and I'm flying to space on a
dedicated research mission
526
00:21:50,320 --> 00:21:51,600
with Virgin Galactic.
527
00:21:51,640 --> 00:21:54,120
I'm gonna be conducting
bioastronautics research.
528
00:21:54,160 --> 00:21:55,800
I'm gonna be conducting
healthcare experiments
529
00:21:55,840 --> 00:21:57,880
and fluid experiments in space.
530
00:21:57,960 --> 00:21:59,920
One of the most emotional
parts of this journey
531
00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:01,120
is seeing it through the eyes
532
00:22:01,160 --> 00:22:03,880
of my four year old's daughter, Delta V.
533
00:22:03,920 --> 00:22:05,720
- Guys, this is important.
534
00:22:05,760 --> 00:22:07,680
My mom used to be an astronaut.
535
00:22:07,720 --> 00:22:09,520
She could go space.
536
00:22:11,400 --> 00:22:13,600
- Delta is growing up
with this new framework.
537
00:22:13,640 --> 00:22:17,040
She believes that going to
space is just something moms do,
538
00:22:17,080 --> 00:22:18,240
and I love that.
539
00:22:19,720 --> 00:22:22,600
We need to have more accurate
representation of humanity
540
00:22:22,640 --> 00:22:24,200
be a part of that.
541
00:22:24,240 --> 00:22:28,200
- One of our major goals
here and our commitment
542
00:22:28,240 --> 00:22:32,200
is to diversity, equity,
inclusion and accessibility
543
00:22:32,280 --> 00:22:33,760
in terms of our workforce.
544
00:22:33,840 --> 00:22:37,080
So we put a lot of effort into making sure
545
00:22:37,120 --> 00:22:38,800
that, you know, we are bringing in
546
00:22:38,840 --> 00:22:41,200
diverse classes of interns.
547
00:22:41,240 --> 00:22:42,720
- [Torsten] Katya was one of those interns.
548
00:22:42,760 --> 00:22:44,040
And look at her now.
549
00:22:44,080 --> 00:22:46,520
She's already being
immortalized as a Barbie,
550
00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:49,120
just like Neil Armstrong and
the other Apollo superstars
551
00:22:49,200 --> 00:22:52,120
were part of the cultural
zeitgeist in their time.
552
00:22:52,200 --> 00:22:55,280
- We know when we have a diverse workforce
553
00:22:55,320 --> 00:22:58,640
that we are going to be more successful.
554
00:22:58,680 --> 00:23:01,960
And so it's really exciting to know
555
00:23:02,000 --> 00:23:04,000
that for the Artemis Mission,
556
00:23:04,080 --> 00:23:07,000
the next humans going to the moon
557
00:23:07,040 --> 00:23:10,840
will be the first woman
and the first person of color.
558
00:23:12,040 --> 00:23:14,200
- [Torsten] As we break
through the galactic glass ceiling,
559
00:23:14,240 --> 00:23:16,400
maybe diversity in space means more
560
00:23:16,440 --> 00:23:19,360
than where you're from,
your skin color, or your gender.
561
00:23:20,320 --> 00:23:22,640
- So one of the realities
that we face here on Earth
562
00:23:22,680 --> 00:23:25,640
is that one out of every five individuals
563
00:23:25,680 --> 00:23:28,120
on the planet right now has some kind
564
00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:30,960
of measurable significant disability.
565
00:23:31,840 --> 00:23:33,600
My name is Dr. Sheri Wells-Jensen,
566
00:23:33,640 --> 00:23:36,720
and I study astrobiology
and disability studies
567
00:23:36,760 --> 00:23:39,520
and how those two things
intersect with one another.
568
00:23:40,560 --> 00:23:43,560
We can't say, "Oh, we're cool with only 80%
569
00:23:43,600 --> 00:23:45,720
of humanity combating global warming
570
00:23:45,760 --> 00:23:48,160
or working on all the other
problems that we have."
571
00:23:48,240 --> 00:23:49,240
We need all of us.
572
00:23:49,320 --> 00:23:52,600
We need our best people
on every job, including space,
573
00:23:52,680 --> 00:23:54,280
not just our best people who happen
574
00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:56,320
to also not have a disability.
575
00:23:56,360 --> 00:23:58,000
- If I was legally blind,
576
00:23:58,080 --> 00:23:59,880
you wouldn't let me pilot this car.
577
00:23:59,920 --> 00:24:02,120
But if I was, say, unable to speak,
578
00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:05,000
you would still consider
me capable of driving, right?
579
00:24:05,040 --> 00:24:06,320
Now, in space,
580
00:24:06,360 --> 00:24:08,920
this notion of what is
and what isn't a disability
581
00:24:09,000 --> 00:24:10,960
is about to get turned upside down.
582
00:24:11,040 --> 00:24:13,600
- What these super qualified,
583
00:24:13,680 --> 00:24:16,000
highly paid individuals have to do
584
00:24:16,040 --> 00:24:19,520
with two hours of their day is exercise.
585
00:24:19,560 --> 00:24:21,480
So if you have someone
586
00:24:21,520 --> 00:24:23,920
who is not worried
about losing muscle mass,
587
00:24:23,960 --> 00:24:25,280
at least in their legs,
588
00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:27,800
does that decrease the amount of time
589
00:24:27,840 --> 00:24:29,240
that they need to exercise?
590
00:24:29,280 --> 00:24:31,280
Do they need to exercise at all?
591
00:24:31,320 --> 00:24:33,560
What is that accommodation that we need
592
00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:36,680
to make a zero gravity
environment accessible
593
00:24:36,720 --> 00:24:38,800
to a disabled scientist
594
00:24:38,880 --> 00:24:42,920
whose job is to go to space
and get their work done?
595
00:24:42,960 --> 00:24:45,200
In 2021 in October,
596
00:24:45,240 --> 00:24:48,040
we chartered our first
zero G parabolic flight
597
00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:51,840
with the Zero G Corporation
and we sent 12 disabled people.
598
00:24:51,880 --> 00:24:54,040
We had some deaf folks, some blind folk.
599
00:24:54,080 --> 00:24:57,040
And our mobility crew,
which are our wheelchair users
600
00:24:57,120 --> 00:24:58,800
and our folks with prosthetics.
601
00:25:00,600 --> 00:25:02,880
(astronauts cheering)
602
00:25:02,920 --> 00:25:04,880
Most fun anyone's ever had in their life
603
00:25:04,920 --> 00:25:05,920
is to be in lunar gravity.
604
00:25:06,000 --> 00:25:07,880
Not gonna lie, we should all go do it.
605
00:25:10,320 --> 00:25:13,240
And we figured out some tasks
606
00:25:13,280 --> 00:25:15,280
that we thought might
be initial investigations
607
00:25:15,360 --> 00:25:16,400
that we wanted to do.
608
00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:22,600
What it revealed to
us is that there's a lot
609
00:25:22,640 --> 00:25:23,800
that we have to learn
610
00:25:24,680 --> 00:25:26,760
and we know how to do it now.
611
00:25:26,800 --> 00:25:29,440
- [Torsten] Dylan is one of
the benefactors of AstroAccess
612
00:25:29,520 --> 00:25:32,320
and many other space companies
are supporting the cause.
613
00:25:33,680 --> 00:25:34,960
- Boy, why space?
614
00:25:35,000 --> 00:25:36,560
Well, because it benefits Earth.
615
00:25:36,600 --> 00:25:38,320
And, oh, by the way, space is gonna happen
616
00:25:38,400 --> 00:25:39,880
whether we want it or not.
617
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:41,920
And I'd rather shape that future
618
00:25:42,000 --> 00:25:43,880
and make sure that humanity 2.0
619
00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:45,960
is a better version of what we've been.
620
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:52,840
- [Torsten] These are the
new faces of new space.
621
00:25:53,880 --> 00:25:55,640
And they've got the right staff.
622
00:26:05,480 --> 00:26:08,320
Okay, so reusability and
other rocket technologies
623
00:26:08,360 --> 00:26:10,840
are elevating the Earth to space sector.
624
00:26:10,880 --> 00:26:14,040
But now the downstream
space to Earth economy
625
00:26:14,080 --> 00:26:16,960
is also seeing dramatic
leaps in innovation.
626
00:26:17,000 --> 00:26:19,760
This enables entirely new business models.
627
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:24,000
Satellites have been
around for a very long time.
628
00:26:24,040 --> 00:26:25,240
Actually not very far from here,
629
00:26:25,320 --> 00:26:26,560
just after World War II,
630
00:26:26,600 --> 00:26:30,040
a young scientist called
Arthur C. Clarke first described,
631
00:26:30,080 --> 00:26:33,280
oh, they could act like
a very large cell tower.
632
00:26:33,320 --> 00:26:35,880
Today we know him as a
towering figure of science fiction
633
00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:39,240
and his principle as
geosynchronous orbit or geo for short.
634
00:26:39,280 --> 00:26:41,120
- And if you think about it militarily,
635
00:26:41,160 --> 00:26:43,200
it is the ultimate high ground, right?
636
00:26:43,240 --> 00:26:45,040
If you have superior assets in space,
637
00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:46,600
you really control the battlefield.
638
00:26:46,640 --> 00:26:49,160
Maybe a bit of Hobbesian fear
639
00:26:49,200 --> 00:26:51,440
about what the other person might be doing.
640
00:26:51,480 --> 00:26:52,880
- [Torsten] That's why the first generation
641
00:26:52,920 --> 00:26:55,400
of satellites was
commandeered by men in uniform
642
00:26:55,440 --> 00:26:57,600
to spy on adversaries.
643
00:26:57,640 --> 00:27:00,480
Get this, decades before
photography was digital
644
00:27:00,520 --> 00:27:02,560
and ground stations could receive data,
645
00:27:02,600 --> 00:27:05,560
actual film canisters had
to be ejected from up high,
646
00:27:05,600 --> 00:27:07,080
slowed down by mini thrusters
647
00:27:07,120 --> 00:27:09,400
and then caught mid air by planes.
648
00:27:09,480 --> 00:27:10,760
Crazy.
649
00:27:10,800 --> 00:27:12,880
Anyway, spy satellites were soon joined
650
00:27:12,960 --> 00:27:15,320
by communications and
observation satellites.
651
00:27:15,360 --> 00:27:17,520
They offered services for the public.
652
00:27:17,560 --> 00:27:20,040
Weather forecasts typically
brought to you by the government
653
00:27:20,080 --> 00:27:22,400
and broadcast television usually provided
654
00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:24,520
by private businesses.
655
00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:27,920
All right, so this is Viasat mock take one.
656
00:27:29,280 --> 00:27:30,520
So who are you?
657
00:27:30,600 --> 00:27:31,880
- Hi, I'm Mark Dankberg..
658
00:27:31,920 --> 00:27:34,160
I am one of the founders of Viasat
659
00:27:34,200 --> 00:27:36,080
and I'm the CEO and chairman.
660
00:27:36,120 --> 00:27:37,720
- So you've been around for a little
661
00:27:37,760 --> 00:27:38,960
longer than two or three years, don't you?
662
00:27:39,000 --> 00:27:41,200
- Yeah, 36 and a half years.
663
00:27:41,240 --> 00:27:42,880
Since we started the company, yeah.
664
00:27:42,960 --> 00:27:45,160
We had a really good technical
understanding of satellite.
665
00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:46,680
We did a lot of defense stuff.
666
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:48,000
We didn't have any money,
667
00:27:48,040 --> 00:27:50,800
we started my house,
and there were three of us.
668
00:27:52,760 --> 00:27:55,440
- A startup story from the 1980s.
669
00:27:55,480 --> 00:27:58,240
Today Viasat is a
multi-billion dollar business
670
00:27:58,280 --> 00:28:00,400
with over 6,000 employees.
671
00:28:00,480 --> 00:28:03,160
They're all about very large
communication assets and geo
672
00:28:03,200 --> 00:28:05,440
that require very large investments.
673
00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:08,640
But haven't we been
told the polar opposite?
674
00:28:11,280 --> 00:28:15,280
Satellites like these used
to be the size of a mini bus.
675
00:28:15,320 --> 00:28:17,720
It took nation states
hundreds of millions of dollars
676
00:28:17,760 --> 00:28:19,200
to launch and operate them.
677
00:28:19,240 --> 00:28:21,880
Today a cube set can be as small as this.
678
00:28:21,920 --> 00:28:24,520
- So that little box is called 1U.
679
00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:27,760
- And everybody wants to
have one, or a few thousand.
680
00:28:27,800 --> 00:28:29,080
- A small fridge size,
681
00:28:29,120 --> 00:28:30,280
another size of a microwave.
682
00:28:30,360 --> 00:28:31,800
- In the size of a loaf of bread.
683
00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:33,440
- The size of a pizza box.
684
00:28:33,480 --> 00:28:35,080
- Maybe two shoe boxes.
685
00:28:35,120 --> 00:28:36,880
- [Torsten] Sheldon, there you are.
686
00:28:38,400 --> 00:28:39,920
Clearly, precision manufacturing
687
00:28:39,960 --> 00:28:41,160
with the latest components
688
00:28:41,200 --> 00:28:43,760
is one of the key drivers in this industry.
689
00:28:43,800 --> 00:28:45,400
- So this is a star camera.
690
00:28:45,440 --> 00:28:47,240
Solar rays fold flat.
691
00:28:47,280 --> 00:28:49,400
There's a really interesting disruption
692
00:28:49,440 --> 00:28:50,480
happening in the industry
693
00:28:50,520 --> 00:28:54,120
where Moore's law was
starting to arrive in space,
694
00:28:54,160 --> 00:28:56,760
and the incumbent
space industry at that time
695
00:28:56,800 --> 00:28:57,960
hadn't quite noticed
696
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:00,040
this massive disruption that was coming.
697
00:29:00,120 --> 00:29:02,840
- [Torsten] Today, Spire
Global operates a constellation
698
00:29:02,880 --> 00:29:04,880
of more than a hundred nanosatellites
699
00:29:04,920 --> 00:29:07,480
that are specialized in
radio frequency technology
700
00:29:07,560 --> 00:29:09,120
and manufactured in Scotland,
701
00:29:09,160 --> 00:29:11,920
a place for the history in electronics.
702
00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:13,520
Though the physics challenges
703
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:16,000
for these devices are out of this world.
704
00:29:16,040 --> 00:29:18,160
- Traveling at eight kilometers per second,
705
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:20,800
which means it goes around
our planet every 90 minutes.
706
00:29:20,840 --> 00:29:23,880
So you go into the hot side
where your plus 100 Celsius
707
00:29:23,920 --> 00:29:27,400
to the cold side, minus 40 Celsius.
708
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:29,600
You can imagine the engineering
challenge that presents
709
00:29:29,640 --> 00:29:32,000
between making sure
your electronics will function
710
00:29:32,040 --> 00:29:33,280
in all these temperatures,
711
00:29:33,320 --> 00:29:34,760
making sure that thermal fatigue,
712
00:29:34,800 --> 00:29:36,760
you know, expansion and contraction
713
00:29:36,800 --> 00:29:39,120
every 90 minutes doesn't cause problems.
714
00:29:40,240 --> 00:29:42,280
- Planet runs the largest constellation
715
00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:43,760
of optical satellites.
716
00:29:43,800 --> 00:29:45,160
Founded back in 2010,
717
00:29:45,200 --> 00:29:48,400
they kept improving the hard and software.
718
00:29:48,440 --> 00:29:49,800
- [Astronaut] Did you
literally start in a garage
719
00:29:49,840 --> 00:29:50,800
or is it just a marketing...
720
00:29:50,880 --> 00:29:52,360
- No, it's not marketing rumor.
721
00:29:52,440 --> 00:29:53,560
We started in a garage.
722
00:29:53,640 --> 00:29:54,400
So since that,
723
00:29:54,440 --> 00:29:56,520
literally had to sweep the
leaves out in the morning.
724
00:29:56,560 --> 00:29:58,120
It wasn't very clean room like.
725
00:29:58,160 --> 00:30:00,320
- [Torsten] So, you build many iterations
726
00:30:00,360 --> 00:30:01,840
and generations of these satellites.
727
00:30:01,920 --> 00:30:03,320
So help me understand, roughly,
728
00:30:03,360 --> 00:30:05,920
like, the performance increase
that you managed to achieve.
729
00:30:06,000 --> 00:30:08,600
- Roughly, over the period of,
730
00:30:08,640 --> 00:30:12,120
from our first satellite to
our latest satellite today,
731
00:30:12,160 --> 00:30:15,480
we've had about a 10,000
fold increase in performance.
732
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:18,640
So that means in terms
of the amount of imagery
733
00:30:18,680 --> 00:30:21,480
produced per day, per dollar spent.
734
00:30:22,320 --> 00:30:24,680
And a 10,000 increase is just...
735
00:30:24,720 --> 00:30:25,760
It's crazy, right?
736
00:30:25,800 --> 00:30:29,160
I mean, very rarely does
that sort of thing happen.
737
00:30:29,200 --> 00:30:30,160
Once somebody said,
738
00:30:30,200 --> 00:30:32,800
"Oh, this is like Model P4.
739
00:30:32,840 --> 00:30:35,680
It's the first mass
manufactured satellite."
740
00:30:35,760 --> 00:30:36,640
And I looked up,
741
00:30:36,680 --> 00:30:37,880
and actually the Model P4
742
00:30:37,920 --> 00:30:39,880
was about two to three times lower cost
743
00:30:39,960 --> 00:30:41,680
than lowest cost cut at that time.
744
00:30:41,720 --> 00:30:44,320
So, this is not two or three X lower cost.
745
00:30:44,360 --> 00:30:47,680
This is hundreds if not thousands of times
746
00:30:47,720 --> 00:30:50,440
lower cost for this
same sort of capability.
747
00:30:50,480 --> 00:30:52,720
That is closer to the revolution in IT
748
00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:55,960
when it went from mainframe
computers to desktop computers.
749
00:30:56,040 --> 00:30:58,320
That's the kind of shift
we're talking about,
750
00:30:58,360 --> 00:31:00,160
and that's happening in space today.
751
00:31:02,440 --> 00:31:04,840
- [Torsten] Shelly, how
about a 2:00 PM booster?
752
00:31:04,920 --> 00:31:06,520
- Satellites I've worked on in the past
753
00:31:06,600 --> 00:31:08,760
have cost up to half a billion dollars.
754
00:31:08,800 --> 00:31:11,160
So now with a CubeSat for example,
755
00:31:11,200 --> 00:31:12,960
you could be launching into space
756
00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:16,760
for, say, 100,000 or 200,000 dollars.
757
00:31:16,800 --> 00:31:19,600
- The entire fleet of
satellites we've ever launched
758
00:31:19,680 --> 00:31:23,800
is much lower cost than a
single typical satellite from NASA
759
00:31:23,880 --> 00:31:25,080
or anyone else.
760
00:31:25,120 --> 00:31:27,440
- [Torsten] That makes mega constellations.
761
00:31:27,480 --> 00:31:28,760
- I hate using the word constellation
762
00:31:28,800 --> 00:31:30,640
'cause that's our word.
763
00:31:30,680 --> 00:31:32,840
Constellations don't move.
764
00:31:32,880 --> 00:31:36,080
They're like there, and the
ancients have seen them
765
00:31:36,120 --> 00:31:38,560
and we have stories about them,
766
00:31:38,640 --> 00:31:42,600
and they took that word
to describe satellites.
767
00:31:42,640 --> 00:31:43,440
Okay?
768
00:31:43,480 --> 00:31:44,880
To describe too many satellites.
769
00:31:44,920 --> 00:31:45,920
- Right.
770
00:31:45,960 --> 00:31:46,760
As I was saying,
771
00:31:46,800 --> 00:31:49,280
these low cost consumer
electronic components
772
00:31:49,320 --> 00:31:51,880
make mega constellations
economically viable.
773
00:31:51,960 --> 00:31:53,960
- The OneWeb project, Kiuper, Starlink,
774
00:31:54,000 --> 00:31:55,840
there are definitely differences in them
775
00:31:55,920 --> 00:31:57,000
that I won't get into right now.
776
00:31:57,040 --> 00:31:59,640
But the idea is they're
all trying to offer a service
777
00:31:59,680 --> 00:32:02,080
that is similar to what
we would've thought of
778
00:32:02,160 --> 00:32:02,920
as satellite internet.
779
00:32:02,960 --> 00:32:03,880
But it is different.
780
00:32:03,960 --> 00:32:07,160
It's designed to work in
places that are harder to reach
781
00:32:07,200 --> 00:32:10,120
or that are in conflict
or that are more mobile.
782
00:32:10,160 --> 00:32:11,760
And so my parents are RVers, you know?
783
00:32:11,800 --> 00:32:14,120
They drive around the
country on one of those big rigs.
784
00:32:14,160 --> 00:32:16,080
And without me ever mentioning Starlink
785
00:32:16,120 --> 00:32:17,160
or any of these companies to them,
786
00:32:17,200 --> 00:32:19,440
they were discussing with
me the various reasons
787
00:32:19,480 --> 00:32:21,920
why this service might
be better than this service.
788
00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:24,880
No one ever says that 60-year-old Americans
789
00:32:24,920 --> 00:32:26,920
are the first adopters of a lot of things,
790
00:32:26,960 --> 00:32:29,600
but we're seeing that, as well as these,
791
00:32:29,640 --> 00:32:31,480
hopefully, these services
be adopted in countries
792
00:32:31,520 --> 00:32:33,960
where they are filling
an even more critical gap.
793
00:32:34,920 --> 00:32:36,360
- Like providing connectivity
794
00:32:36,400 --> 00:32:38,920
that cannot be shot off even in war,
795
00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:40,920
Starlink is getting a lot of attention
796
00:32:40,960 --> 00:32:43,320
and is already generating a ton of cash.
797
00:32:43,360 --> 00:32:46,240
But internet from space isn't new at all.
798
00:32:46,280 --> 00:32:49,600
So, Mark, basically I'm
coming here to this place.
799
00:32:49,640 --> 00:32:52,040
The whole day is for
this one question, okay?
800
00:32:52,080 --> 00:32:54,880
People in this industry
have been telling me
801
00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:56,840
the costs to build a satellite
802
00:32:56,880 --> 00:33:00,120
is a couple hundred thousand
dollars that the size of this,
803
00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:03,440
and you're building a $2
billion fleet of three satellites.
804
00:33:03,480 --> 00:33:04,840
Are you crazy?
805
00:33:04,920 --> 00:33:06,280
- No. (laughs)
806
00:33:06,360 --> 00:33:08,440
When you're really close to the Earth,
807
00:33:08,480 --> 00:33:10,360
your field of view is small.
808
00:33:10,440 --> 00:33:14,600
What turned out is, the
farther away you go from Earth,
809
00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:17,120
the more of it you can see.
810
00:33:17,160 --> 00:33:18,760
So now I'm accessible...
811
00:33:18,800 --> 00:33:22,080
Instead of just to this
small area underneath me,
812
00:33:22,120 --> 00:33:24,720
I'm accessible to a very large market.
813
00:33:24,760 --> 00:33:26,080
- [Galactic Gal] Hey this is Galactic Gal.
814
00:33:26,160 --> 00:33:27,880
Let me take it over from here.
815
00:33:27,920 --> 00:33:30,000
Compared to LEO, the geosynchronous orbit
816
00:33:30,040 --> 00:33:32,080
is about 100 times farther from Earth,
817
00:33:32,120 --> 00:33:34,200
and satellites there
are all circling the planet
818
00:33:34,240 --> 00:33:35,800
in the same direction.
819
00:33:35,840 --> 00:33:38,120
Think of it as a fixed parking position.
820
00:33:38,160 --> 00:33:40,200
Some very powerful satellites are here
821
00:33:40,240 --> 00:33:42,520
because it's almost always sunny.
822
00:33:42,560 --> 00:33:43,960
Viasat's rationale for geo
823
00:33:44,040 --> 00:33:45,840
is also based on the technical ability
824
00:33:45,880 --> 00:33:49,200
to focus its beam on
areas where the demand is.
825
00:33:49,240 --> 00:33:51,440
In fact, 95% of the world population
826
00:33:51,480 --> 00:33:54,680
lives on only 10% of the land.
827
00:33:54,720 --> 00:33:57,040
In other words, the
majority of economic activity
828
00:33:57,080 --> 00:34:00,880
happens on only 3% of
our blue planet surface.
829
00:34:00,920 --> 00:34:03,600
We can see human activity
with a naked eye at night.
830
00:34:03,640 --> 00:34:05,800
From geo, all these markets can be served
831
00:34:05,840 --> 00:34:07,760
with very few satellites.
832
00:34:07,800 --> 00:34:09,160
Meanwhile, in low Earth orbit,
833
00:34:09,240 --> 00:34:12,040
the new space constellations
are spending most of their time
834
00:34:12,080 --> 00:34:14,200
over oceans and unpopulated areas
835
00:34:14,280 --> 00:34:16,040
where there are no customers.
836
00:34:16,080 --> 00:34:18,320
Moreover, they are in
the shade half of the time
837
00:34:18,360 --> 00:34:19,800
each round trip.
838
00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:21,320
Their position in very low orbit
839
00:34:21,360 --> 00:34:23,600
brings the benefits of
much lower launch costs
840
00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:25,000
and lower latency,
841
00:34:25,040 --> 00:34:27,600
but this also means a
much smaller field of view.
842
00:34:27,640 --> 00:34:28,720
That's why so many are needed
843
00:34:28,800 --> 00:34:31,200
to offer reliable communication services.
844
00:34:32,560 --> 00:34:33,840
- [Torsten] But there are more use cases
845
00:34:33,880 --> 00:34:35,680
than just internet connectivity.
846
00:34:35,720 --> 00:34:38,840
This UK-based fund has
deployed around $300 million
847
00:34:38,880 --> 00:34:41,160
in over a hundred different companies.
848
00:34:42,240 --> 00:34:43,520
- And our thesis at Seraphim
849
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:46,400
is that that is now creating
a digital infrastructure
850
00:34:46,440 --> 00:34:47,880
in the sky.
851
00:34:47,920 --> 00:34:51,280
So this is about space
looking down at planet Earth.
852
00:34:51,360 --> 00:34:53,280
This digital infrastructure
which is made up
853
00:34:53,320 --> 00:34:56,080
of hundreds and thousands of satellites
854
00:34:56,160 --> 00:34:58,800
are able to collect data,
855
00:34:58,840 --> 00:35:02,160
a tsunami of data that they're
collecting about our planet
856
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:04,760
in high resolution, low
cost, and importantly,
857
00:35:04,800 --> 00:35:06,760
real time or close to real time.
858
00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:10,160
And we believe that
this digital infrastructure
859
00:35:10,200 --> 00:35:12,760
is a bit like the creation
of a new internet.
860
00:35:12,840 --> 00:35:16,120
This is creating a trillion
dollar market opportunity.
861
00:35:17,200 --> 00:35:18,000
- In other words,
862
00:35:18,040 --> 00:35:21,000
different constellations
for different markets.
863
00:35:21,040 --> 00:35:23,200
There's optical radar, infrared,
864
00:35:23,280 --> 00:35:24,720
so many different technologies
865
00:35:24,760 --> 00:35:26,760
serving different customer needs.
866
00:35:28,560 --> 00:35:29,760
In a dark forest,
867
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:33,400
MindPoint's Sven has
identified a market opportunity.
868
00:35:33,480 --> 00:35:36,160
He's building a business
based on all this new data.
869
00:35:37,040 --> 00:35:40,000
And how can you help
me not have train delays?
870
00:35:40,080 --> 00:35:41,440
- That's a great question.
871
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:43,600
So what we do is we analyze satellite data
872
00:35:43,680 --> 00:35:45,640
and identify precisely where trees
873
00:35:45,680 --> 00:35:48,040
are sending too close to railway tracks
874
00:35:48,080 --> 00:35:50,280
and where they could
fall potentially on them.
875
00:35:50,320 --> 00:35:51,960
The trees is one of the biggest reasons
876
00:35:52,000 --> 00:35:53,440
why trains are being delayed.
877
00:35:53,480 --> 00:35:55,960
We can identify where the trees are,
878
00:35:56,040 --> 00:35:58,040
how tall they are, whether they are sick.
879
00:35:58,080 --> 00:36:00,520
What we do is we take two satellite images
880
00:36:00,560 --> 00:36:03,080
which are taken from
slightly different angles.
881
00:36:03,120 --> 00:36:04,600
And from these two satellite images,
882
00:36:04,640 --> 00:36:06,480
we calculate the height of the tree.
883
00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:08,440
It works very similar to your human eyes
884
00:36:08,480 --> 00:36:11,200
so your eyes can calculate depth.
885
00:36:11,280 --> 00:36:13,720
- Ha, 3D glasses for satellites.
886
00:36:13,760 --> 00:36:15,120
Brilliant.
887
00:36:15,160 --> 00:36:16,720
LiveEO has raised one of the largest
888
00:36:16,760 --> 00:36:18,400
space investment rounds in Europe.
889
00:36:18,440 --> 00:36:21,280
They already protect millions
of miles of railway tracks
890
00:36:21,320 --> 00:36:23,680
and electrical grids globally.
891
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:24,520
With their help,
892
00:36:24,560 --> 00:36:26,840
I'll make it to my next
destination on time.
893
00:36:27,760 --> 00:36:30,560
A former American spy
station in Berlin, Teufelsberg.
894
00:36:32,520 --> 00:36:34,760
Locations like this remind
us that governments
895
00:36:34,800 --> 00:36:36,480
have been spying on other governments,
896
00:36:36,520 --> 00:36:39,280
and sometimes their own
citizens, for a very long time.
897
00:36:40,400 --> 00:36:43,200
But finally space data can empower us
898
00:36:43,240 --> 00:36:45,000
to look back at government activities
899
00:36:45,040 --> 00:36:46,600
with a virtual time machine.
900
00:36:47,440 --> 00:36:49,480
- I think our data in general
can be very empowering
901
00:36:49,520 --> 00:36:51,160
for journalists around the world.
902
00:36:51,240 --> 00:36:53,480
It's a tool that enables
them to see what's going on.
903
00:36:53,520 --> 00:36:57,440
It was a great case where
some journalists from Buzzfeed
904
00:36:57,480 --> 00:37:01,480
had used our data to discover
Uyghur detention camps.
905
00:37:01,520 --> 00:37:03,520
- Megh is an investigative journalist
906
00:37:03,560 --> 00:37:05,120
who was based in China for many years
907
00:37:05,160 --> 00:37:07,520
until somehow her visa wasn't extended.
908
00:37:07,560 --> 00:37:08,360
Thanks, Luke.
909
00:37:08,400 --> 00:37:09,320
Thanks for catching that.
910
00:37:09,360 --> 00:37:11,680
Satellite data helped
her and two collaborators
911
00:37:11,720 --> 00:37:13,480
to get to the truth on the ground,
912
00:37:13,520 --> 00:37:15,440
and they want a Pulitzer for it.
913
00:37:15,480 --> 00:37:17,520
- So basically the process started
914
00:37:17,560 --> 00:37:19,960
actually with Baidu Maps
915
00:37:20,040 --> 00:37:21,800
where we noticed that the government
916
00:37:21,840 --> 00:37:24,640
was essentially putting grayed out tiles
917
00:37:24,680 --> 00:37:28,040
over a number of locations in Xinjiang.
918
00:37:28,080 --> 00:37:30,520
- [Torsten] Low resolution
images that looked like this.
919
00:37:30,560 --> 00:37:32,880
Megh and her team suspected
920
00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:35,440
that the Chinese government
was censoring Baidu Maps
921
00:37:35,480 --> 00:37:37,280
to hide prison camps holding Uyghurs
922
00:37:37,320 --> 00:37:39,000
and other Muslim minorities.
923
00:37:39,040 --> 00:37:41,640
Ultimately, they used high
resolution images from planet
924
00:37:41,680 --> 00:37:43,840
to identify several hundred new prison
925
00:37:43,920 --> 00:37:45,240
and detainment centers.
926
00:37:45,280 --> 00:37:48,600
- We won the Pulitzer Prize in 2021.
927
00:37:48,640 --> 00:37:50,920
We were really grateful for that award
928
00:37:50,960 --> 00:37:52,960
because it brought a lot more attention
929
00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:55,800
to the work than I think it
would've otherwise gotten.
930
00:37:58,360 --> 00:38:01,000
- It's mind boggling to
me how this panopticon
931
00:38:01,040 --> 00:38:02,560
could have changed world history.
932
00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:05,160
Think about the Cuban missile crisis
933
00:38:05,200 --> 00:38:07,600
or the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
934
00:38:07,640 --> 00:38:09,240
- Again, it comes to accountability.
935
00:38:09,280 --> 00:38:13,360
I think it will change the
political calculus going forward
936
00:38:13,440 --> 00:38:14,480
if everyone gets to know
937
00:38:14,520 --> 00:38:17,640
that these things aren't gonna
be possible to hide anymore.
938
00:38:17,720 --> 00:38:18,640
(camera shutter clicks)
939
00:38:18,680 --> 00:38:22,080
- So let's imagine a world
where traffic jams, oil spills,
940
00:38:22,120 --> 00:38:25,480
troop movements, bouncy
castles, everything can be seen
941
00:38:25,520 --> 00:38:28,520
and verified by everyone
almost in real time.
942
00:38:29,520 --> 00:38:31,040
Journalists, the open source
943
00:38:31,080 --> 00:38:32,680
intelligence community on Reddit,
944
00:38:32,720 --> 00:38:35,640
the good guys, the bad guys, me and you.
945
00:38:36,520 --> 00:38:38,160
- But yes, we work with militaries.
946
00:38:38,200 --> 00:38:39,840
And I wanna say this about this,
947
00:38:39,880 --> 00:38:43,800
we do that on purpose, in good faith,
948
00:38:43,840 --> 00:38:48,040
because we believe that it
will enhance peace and security
949
00:38:48,120 --> 00:38:50,280
with one important caveat.
950
00:38:50,320 --> 00:38:52,480
We will never do it exclusively.
951
00:38:52,560 --> 00:38:55,000
We will not give this image to this client
952
00:38:55,040 --> 00:38:58,880
with saying, "I will never
give this to anyone else."
953
00:38:58,920 --> 00:39:00,760
If the New York Times also
wants access to that image,
954
00:39:00,800 --> 00:39:02,360
they can also get access to that image.
955
00:39:02,400 --> 00:39:05,800
If the UN and this NGO
wants access to that image,
956
00:39:05,840 --> 00:39:07,440
they can also get access to that image.
957
00:39:07,480 --> 00:39:09,880
- But can't the bad guys hide in the dark?
958
00:39:09,920 --> 00:39:11,880
Well, turns out there's a set for that.
959
00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:14,560
- [Tero] Real-time SAR.
960
00:39:14,640 --> 00:39:16,160
- [Torsten] Which is a form of radar.
961
00:39:16,200 --> 00:39:20,280
- That is something that can
be looked through the clouds,
962
00:39:20,320 --> 00:39:24,040
through the darkness,
through rain, through snowfall.
963
00:39:24,080 --> 00:39:26,200
You don't need the optical light
964
00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:29,000
in the Arctic areas where
you have the darkness,
965
00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:30,880
I mean, half of the year.
966
00:39:30,920 --> 00:39:33,400
Or if you go to an area like the Amazon
967
00:39:33,440 --> 00:39:35,920
where there's a lot of rain all the time,
968
00:39:35,960 --> 00:39:39,240
it doesn't matter when you
have a radar constellation.
969
00:39:39,280 --> 00:39:41,320
But also many other layers of data,
970
00:39:41,360 --> 00:39:43,560
including geographical data,
971
00:39:43,600 --> 00:39:46,560
stuff like meteorological
reports and things like that
972
00:39:46,600 --> 00:39:48,680
where we help the insurance companies
973
00:39:48,720 --> 00:39:50,720
to predict a flood development
974
00:39:50,760 --> 00:39:52,680
or we support the Finnish icebreakers
975
00:39:52,720 --> 00:39:53,960
in the Bay of Bothnian area.
976
00:39:54,000 --> 00:39:57,080
We take images, how the
ice develops, you name it.
977
00:39:57,120 --> 00:40:00,080
A lot of different types of use cases.
978
00:40:00,120 --> 00:40:02,760
- So optical satellites look
at the outside of the building,
979
00:40:02,800 --> 00:40:05,800
infrared gives you an inference
on what's going on inside.
980
00:40:05,880 --> 00:40:07,480
So it sort of opens the box.
981
00:40:07,520 --> 00:40:10,360
It's a new category of
Earth observation data.
982
00:40:10,400 --> 00:40:12,160
If you're a housing association,
983
00:40:12,240 --> 00:40:13,960
then you would be interested in this data
984
00:40:14,000 --> 00:40:18,120
to make sure that your
portfolio is getting to net zero.
985
00:40:19,960 --> 00:40:21,160
- [Torsten] The tech is maturing.
986
00:40:21,240 --> 00:40:22,600
It can defeat darkness,
987
00:40:22,640 --> 00:40:25,720
peak through clouds
or locate leaky windows.
988
00:40:25,760 --> 00:40:27,120
And there's even a Canadian company
989
00:40:27,160 --> 00:40:29,400
that can detect cow farts from space.
990
00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:31,800
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas.
991
00:40:33,640 --> 00:40:34,800
Eat your veggies.
992
00:40:36,040 --> 00:40:38,400
- We have a huge vision going forward
993
00:40:38,440 --> 00:40:40,240
to enable this transition
994
00:40:40,280 --> 00:40:42,640
to a sustainable economy
and a secure world.
995
00:40:42,680 --> 00:40:44,840
- [Torsten] Climate tech,
a trillion dollar opportunity
996
00:40:44,880 --> 00:40:47,080
for Earth observation companies.
997
00:40:47,160 --> 00:40:48,600
- We have fantastic investors at...
998
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:51,160
- One of planet's latest
investors is BlackRock,
999
00:40:51,240 --> 00:40:52,920
the world's largest asset firm.
1000
00:40:52,960 --> 00:40:55,360
- Oh, they're trying to
demand all their companies
1001
00:40:55,400 --> 00:40:56,920
to track their ESG.
1002
00:40:56,960 --> 00:40:58,240
And the E in ESG is environment.
1003
00:40:58,320 --> 00:40:59,840
- Yeah, and what's good for the planet
1004
00:40:59,880 --> 00:41:01,240
is good for planet, right?
1005
00:41:01,280 --> 00:41:02,520
- Well, that's also true.
1006
00:41:04,600 --> 00:41:07,480
- I mean, I remember that first Earth Day
1007
00:41:07,560 --> 00:41:10,080
and, you know, that view from space
1008
00:41:10,120 --> 00:41:12,640
back looking at our planet
1009
00:41:12,680 --> 00:41:14,840
that you know kind of became the beginning
1010
00:41:14,880 --> 00:41:17,080
of the environmental movement.
1011
00:41:17,160 --> 00:41:21,440
That we are just one part
of the greater universe.
1012
00:41:21,480 --> 00:41:24,200
And how do we make sure that we survive?
1013
00:41:24,240 --> 00:41:26,080
There were a lot of things that came up.
1014
00:41:26,120 --> 00:41:29,280
A new awareness, a new consciousness
1015
00:41:29,320 --> 00:41:30,960
- Now, to live long and prosper,
1016
00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:34,240
humans and vulcans need a planet.
1017
00:41:34,320 --> 00:41:37,000
Climate science relies
heavily on satellite data.
1018
00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:40,840
Using AI, we can now
zero in identify and analyze
1019
00:41:40,880 --> 00:41:42,840
billions of individual trees.
1020
00:41:43,960 --> 00:41:47,720
- So space diplomacy and
space information is critical.
1021
00:41:47,760 --> 00:41:49,720
Climate change is a global problem.
1022
00:41:49,800 --> 00:41:52,240
We can't solve it without global data.
1023
00:41:52,280 --> 00:41:54,120
Without that big picture view
1024
00:41:54,160 --> 00:41:56,360
of what's happening on our planet.
1025
00:41:56,400 --> 00:41:58,000
And making sure that every country
1026
00:41:58,040 --> 00:41:59,320
is meeting their pledges.
1027
00:41:59,360 --> 00:42:02,520
And that globally, we're
able to meet our targets
1028
00:42:02,560 --> 00:42:06,360
for keeping within 1.5
degrees Celsius of warming.
1029
00:42:06,400 --> 00:42:08,200
- Actually, over half of our users,
1030
00:42:08,280 --> 00:42:12,480
half of the users are scientific
communities worldwide.
1031
00:42:12,520 --> 00:42:15,400
And they have published
over the last few years
1032
00:42:15,440 --> 00:42:17,040
more than 2,000 papers.
1033
00:42:17,080 --> 00:42:21,280
Research papers, thesis
and also white papers.
1034
00:42:21,360 --> 00:42:23,320
- Legal fishing, another great example.
1035
00:42:23,360 --> 00:42:25,520
We are plundering the oceans now.
1036
00:42:25,560 --> 00:42:27,680
There are many bad actors in the ocean,
1037
00:42:27,720 --> 00:42:29,480
and the only way we can tell
1038
00:42:29,520 --> 00:42:32,480
how much they're impacting the ocean
1039
00:42:32,520 --> 00:42:36,360
is by following their tracks in space.
1040
00:42:36,400 --> 00:42:39,440
- So one of our portfolio
companies, HawkEye 360,
1041
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:41,760
they are the largest
constellation of radio frequency
1042
00:42:41,800 --> 00:42:44,120
signal intelligence satellites.
1043
00:42:44,160 --> 00:42:47,000
So that means that they're
able to monitor signals
1044
00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:50,080
from walkie talkies or mobile phones.
1045
00:42:50,160 --> 00:42:52,000
- [Torsten] When a boat
switches off their beacon,
1046
00:42:52,040 --> 00:42:56,080
Spire Global notices it
and notifies Hawk I 360.
1047
00:42:56,160 --> 00:42:57,520
Their small sats can detect
1048
00:42:57,600 --> 00:42:59,960
and document the dark vessel's activities.
1049
00:43:00,840 --> 00:43:02,800
- And they're able to
then use that information
1050
00:43:02,880 --> 00:43:05,440
to hold the owners of that boat to account.
1051
00:43:05,520 --> 00:43:06,800
- [Torsten] Yeah.
1052
00:43:06,840 --> 00:43:07,960
- So this can ultimately eradicate things
1053
00:43:08,040 --> 00:43:09,480
like illegal fishing,
1054
00:43:09,520 --> 00:43:11,480
but it can also work on other areas
1055
00:43:11,520 --> 00:43:14,400
- [Torsten] Like drug or human trafficking.
1056
00:43:14,440 --> 00:43:17,320
Next stop, Ecuador, where
they make heavenly coffee
1057
00:43:18,960 --> 00:43:21,960
and where agriculture
is critical to the economy.
1058
00:43:23,920 --> 00:43:28,320
- Size of our pineapple farm is 230 acres
1059
00:43:28,360 --> 00:43:29,400
And we produce seven
1060
00:43:29,440 --> 00:43:31,560
to eight shipping containers every week.
1061
00:43:31,600 --> 00:43:34,760
About 70% of it is exported overseas,
1062
00:43:34,800 --> 00:43:37,760
30% is for domestic sales.
1063
00:43:37,800 --> 00:43:40,640
- I had asked an Irish
company, Origin Digital,
1064
00:43:40,680 --> 00:43:43,960
to do a thorough biomass
analysis of Emilio's Fields.
1065
00:43:44,040 --> 00:43:46,200
This is what I'm showing him here.
1066
00:43:46,240 --> 00:43:49,440
- So one of the many
challenges that farmers have
1067
00:43:49,480 --> 00:43:52,600
is to be able to keep an eye on the crops
1068
00:43:52,640 --> 00:43:55,120
and how the crops are
developing seamlessly.
1069
00:43:55,200 --> 00:43:57,680
So they have to walk miles and miles
1070
00:43:57,720 --> 00:43:59,560
to be able to find that out.
1071
00:43:59,600 --> 00:44:02,680
And that too, they do
not have bird's eye view
1072
00:44:02,720 --> 00:44:03,960
of the entire thing.
1073
00:44:04,000 --> 00:44:05,200
- [Torsten] Madhumita says
1074
00:44:05,280 --> 00:44:06,920
that their sophisticated analytics
1075
00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:08,600
can help Emilio to understand
1076
00:44:08,640 --> 00:44:10,240
where a pest might be spreading,
1077
00:44:10,320 --> 00:44:12,400
where he should use
more or less fertilizers,
1078
00:44:12,480 --> 00:44:15,800
or adjust irrigation where
the moisture levels aren't right.
1079
00:44:15,840 --> 00:44:17,880
This is a potential game changer.
1080
00:44:17,920 --> 00:44:19,760
- If the farmers are using
1081
00:44:19,800 --> 00:44:23,600
our optimal technology and software,
1082
00:44:23,640 --> 00:44:27,760
yield can increase to
around 11 and a half times
1083
00:44:27,800 --> 00:44:32,240
per hectare, which is like
straight away 38% increase.
1084
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:33,840
That is phenomenal.
1085
00:44:33,880 --> 00:44:36,600
- This would be a useful
tool as we would save money
1086
00:44:36,640 --> 00:44:40,560
and a lot of factors like
analysis and laboratories.
1087
00:44:40,600 --> 00:44:44,120
We technicians could manage
everything here on the ground,
1088
00:44:44,160 --> 00:44:45,720
and that would be invaluable.
1089
00:44:47,640 --> 00:44:49,920
- We are the top quality producers
1090
00:44:49,960 --> 00:44:54,960
of food-based products in
Ecuador such as pulps, jams,
1091
00:44:56,160 --> 00:44:59,680
toppings that are used
in the food industry.
1092
00:44:59,760 --> 00:45:02,080
We have clients in the dairy,
1093
00:45:02,120 --> 00:45:04,160
in the ice cream industries.
1094
00:45:04,240 --> 00:45:06,880
(upbeat music)
1095
00:45:06,920 --> 00:45:10,240
In the food industry, we
use not high tech technology
1096
00:45:10,320 --> 00:45:12,880
but we should start moving over there.
1097
00:45:12,960 --> 00:45:14,800
Resources are very limited,
1098
00:45:14,840 --> 00:45:18,040
Water, soil, and the
population keeps growing,
1099
00:45:18,120 --> 00:45:20,800
so therefore we need to look for better
1100
00:45:20,880 --> 00:45:23,400
and higher technology
to introduce to our sector.
1101
00:45:24,360 --> 00:45:26,520
- [Torsten] Okay, drones
make me kind of nervous,
1102
00:45:26,560 --> 00:45:27,400
I'm out of here.
1103
00:45:29,400 --> 00:45:31,600
EO Constellations, the hardware,
1104
00:45:31,680 --> 00:45:33,440
and machine learning, the software,
1105
00:45:33,480 --> 00:45:37,280
make monitoring millions of
farms possible on a daily basis.
1106
00:45:37,320 --> 00:45:39,960
- So defense and climate are connected.
1107
00:45:40,000 --> 00:45:44,880
As the climate changes,
there will be droughts, wildfires,
1108
00:45:44,920 --> 00:45:47,920
and other natural disasters
1109
00:45:47,960 --> 00:45:50,040
which might lead to migration of people,
1110
00:45:50,080 --> 00:45:52,160
which is obviously a security issue.
1111
00:45:52,200 --> 00:45:53,920
- No matter where I go in this industry,
1112
00:45:54,000 --> 00:45:57,080
national security is always close by.
1113
00:45:57,120 --> 00:45:59,960
How about the CIA, venture capital fund,
1114
00:46:00,000 --> 00:46:01,120
the involvement there?
1115
00:46:02,080 --> 00:46:04,200
- They don't like to
be called the CIA fund.
1116
00:46:04,240 --> 00:46:06,120
One of our investors is In-Q-Tel
1117
00:46:06,160 --> 00:46:10,280
that represents the US
defense intelligence community.
1118
00:46:10,320 --> 00:46:14,560
So they allow us to sell our data
1119
00:46:14,600 --> 00:46:17,000
and open doors to those agencies
1120
00:46:17,040 --> 00:46:21,040
that are interested in
intelligence as a whole.
1121
00:46:21,080 --> 00:46:22,360
- I hear echoes of my meeting
1122
00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:23,920
with the co-inventor of the internet.
1123
00:46:23,960 --> 00:46:26,080
It was also funded by the Pentagon.
1124
00:46:26,160 --> 00:46:29,560
That's the thing, defense
isn't a dirty word in space.
1125
00:46:29,640 --> 00:46:31,600
Satellites protect ecosystems
1126
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:33,960
but also connect weapon systems.
1127
00:46:34,920 --> 00:46:36,720
Developed by the Department of Defense
1128
00:46:36,760 --> 00:46:38,960
and still operated by the US Space Force,
1129
00:46:39,000 --> 00:46:42,600
GPS is the one space service
that everyone uses daily.
1130
00:46:42,640 --> 00:46:44,400
And now startups see an opportunity
1131
00:46:44,440 --> 00:46:46,320
in the satellite navigation market.
1132
00:46:46,360 --> 00:46:49,040
This one, funded by
Lockheed Martin and Toyota,
1133
00:46:49,080 --> 00:46:52,920
wants to enhance the accuracy
of GPS to a few centimeters.
1134
00:46:54,000 --> 00:46:56,240
Aren't you competing with like the biggest
1135
00:46:56,280 --> 00:46:57,800
and most powerful governments in the world?
1136
00:46:57,840 --> 00:47:00,280
China, Russia, the US and the European.
1137
00:47:00,360 --> 00:47:02,240
They all have their own GPS.
1138
00:47:02,280 --> 00:47:04,640
- So we're not competing
with (indistinct) actually.
1139
00:47:04,680 --> 00:47:07,000
What we're doing is that
we are augmenting GPS.
1140
00:47:07,040 --> 00:47:10,200
So autonomous vehicles,
they need to know precisely
1141
00:47:10,240 --> 00:47:12,480
where they are on the road,
1142
00:47:12,520 --> 00:47:14,160
what they are on the road,
1143
00:47:14,200 --> 00:47:16,120
and where within that lane they are.
1144
00:47:16,200 --> 00:47:17,600
- All these satellites need to place
1145
00:47:17,640 --> 00:47:19,320
to beam back the data.
1146
00:47:19,360 --> 00:47:21,280
Contact is a South Korean company
1147
00:47:21,320 --> 00:47:22,760
that operates a global network
1148
00:47:22,800 --> 00:47:24,560
of ground stations like these.
1149
00:47:26,520 --> 00:47:28,560
Clients include Viasat and ISI,
1150
00:47:28,600 --> 00:47:30,320
allowing them to focus on things
1151
00:47:30,360 --> 00:47:32,680
other than building
dishes in remote places.
1152
00:47:34,440 --> 00:47:36,480
So how many constellation pitch decks
1153
00:47:36,520 --> 00:47:38,000
have you seen and watched
1154
00:47:38,040 --> 00:47:40,480
and how many are there
being built right now?
1155
00:47:40,560 --> 00:47:43,120
- We get to see around a hundred a month,
1156
00:47:43,160 --> 00:47:46,400
and we have consistently since 2016.
1157
00:47:46,440 --> 00:47:49,320
So that's thousands of
businesses around the world
1158
00:47:49,360 --> 00:47:53,120
that are looking to
develop technology solutions
1159
00:47:53,160 --> 00:47:55,360
to address this market.
1160
00:47:55,400 --> 00:47:57,880
- It doesn't take a genius to predict
1161
00:47:57,960 --> 00:48:00,600
that the number of
satellites is going to take off.
1162
00:48:00,640 --> 00:48:02,760
(indistinct) Arthur C. Clarke
1163
00:48:02,800 --> 00:48:05,480
wrote about accumulating
space junk back in the 1970s.
1164
00:48:10,400 --> 00:48:12,880
You probably remember this
from my previous documentary.
1165
00:48:12,960 --> 00:48:15,280
Before mass production and standardization,
1166
00:48:15,360 --> 00:48:18,720
cars used to be just toys
for rich people, really.
1167
00:48:18,760 --> 00:48:21,640
Well, at one point, satellites
used to be the size of cars
1168
00:48:21,680 --> 00:48:23,920
and were so complex and expensive
1169
00:48:23,960 --> 00:48:26,520
that only a handful of
countries could afford them.
1170
00:48:27,800 --> 00:48:30,120
Well, those costs are now plunging.
1171
00:48:30,160 --> 00:48:31,600
So just like on our roads
1172
00:48:31,640 --> 00:48:33,720
where space is congested and contested,
1173
00:48:33,760 --> 00:48:36,840
LEO is getting so crowded,
we may need to check for traffic.
1174
00:48:38,560 --> 00:48:40,440
- We don't put satellites in random places.
1175
00:48:40,480 --> 00:48:43,840
We put 'em on very
specific orbital highways.
1176
00:48:43,920 --> 00:48:45,400
Just like regular highways
1177
00:48:45,480 --> 00:48:48,600
have a finite capacity for space traffic,
1178
00:48:48,640 --> 00:48:49,880
each of these orbital highways
1179
00:48:49,920 --> 00:48:52,120
has a carrying capacity as well
1180
00:48:52,200 --> 00:48:53,880
for safety and sustainability.
1181
00:48:53,920 --> 00:48:55,840
- It's really quite shocking
when you think about it.
1182
00:48:55,880 --> 00:48:58,080
We are racing into this domain
1183
00:48:58,160 --> 00:49:02,280
and we don't actually know
what it's carrying capacity is.
1184
00:49:02,320 --> 00:49:04,000
- With low Earth orbit,
1185
00:49:04,080 --> 00:49:06,520
you have satellites that
are crossing in space
1186
00:49:06,560 --> 00:49:09,280
at 15,000 miles an hour.
1187
00:49:09,360 --> 00:49:11,280
The speed at which things happen
1188
00:49:11,320 --> 00:49:15,040
and the consequences of a
collision are enormously worse.
1189
00:49:15,120 --> 00:49:16,920
Nobody cleans up after you in space.
1190
00:49:16,960 --> 00:49:18,640
- Let's go back in time
1191
00:49:18,720 --> 00:49:22,480
when plastic was invented
1192
00:49:22,520 --> 00:49:27,120
and became a significant commodity
1193
00:49:27,160 --> 00:49:29,440
in the packaging of goods.
1194
00:49:29,520 --> 00:49:30,280
- [Torsten] Everywhere.
1195
00:49:30,320 --> 00:49:32,880
- Nobody's thinking,
one day we're gonna have
1196
00:49:32,920 --> 00:49:35,240
to get this plastic out of the ocean.
1197
00:49:35,280 --> 00:49:37,480
We were just throwing away plastic.
1198
00:49:37,560 --> 00:49:39,640
- Compared to plastic in the ocean, though,
1199
00:49:39,680 --> 00:49:42,480
space junk is a lot faster and more lethal.
1200
00:49:42,520 --> 00:49:44,880
You see, at this speed,
it will take me an hour
1201
00:49:44,920 --> 00:49:46,320
to cross the city.
1202
00:49:46,360 --> 00:49:48,000
Satellites do it in a second.
1203
00:49:48,960 --> 00:49:50,440
- [Galactic Gal] Everything
in orbit is traveling
1204
00:49:50,480 --> 00:49:54,800
at the same speed of around
25,000 kilometers an hour.
1205
00:49:54,840 --> 00:49:58,000
That's more than four miles per second.
1206
00:49:58,040 --> 00:50:00,480
Anything faster would
reach escape velocity,
1207
00:50:00,520 --> 00:50:01,880
and maybe the moon.
1208
00:50:01,920 --> 00:50:04,960
Anything slower would be
pulled back by Earth's gravity.
1209
00:50:05,000 --> 00:50:06,440
This constant high speed
1210
00:50:06,480 --> 00:50:09,360
is the reason why even
small objects are lethal.
1211
00:50:09,400 --> 00:50:11,680
- Yeah, so even a piece of debris
1212
00:50:11,760 --> 00:50:13,280
the size of a Tempe coin
1213
00:50:13,320 --> 00:50:15,680
can cause catastrophic
damage to a satellite.
1214
00:50:17,160 --> 00:50:18,160
- [Galactic Gal] These two satellites
1215
00:50:18,200 --> 00:50:20,360
cross paths every 90 minutes,
1216
00:50:20,400 --> 00:50:23,720
tens of thousands of times
during their operational life.
1217
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:25,720
Even if these two never collide,
1218
00:50:25,800 --> 00:50:28,400
there are thousands
of other to worry about.
1219
00:50:30,360 --> 00:50:33,120
- [Torsten] Astroscale has
been on my radar for a while.
1220
00:50:33,160 --> 00:50:34,240
This Japanese company
1221
00:50:34,320 --> 00:50:36,800
wants to mitigate
cascading collisions in orbit.
1222
00:50:41,760 --> 00:50:44,240
- We're not gonna pick
up all those small pieces.
1223
00:50:44,280 --> 00:50:46,800
What we need to do is stop the big pieces
1224
00:50:46,840 --> 00:50:48,480
from coming to small pieces.
1225
00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:51,240
'Cause even the small
pieces are a significant risk,
1226
00:50:51,280 --> 00:50:53,120
and that could destroy a satellite
1227
00:50:53,160 --> 00:50:54,840
or destroy a space station.
1228
00:50:56,760 --> 00:50:58,560
- What we're seeing
here, this is kind of scary
1229
00:50:58,600 --> 00:50:59,800
to think about something like this
1230
00:50:59,880 --> 00:51:03,640
reentering and like maybe
hitting a populated area.
1231
00:51:03,680 --> 00:51:06,400
We see more and more
of these big rocket bodies
1232
00:51:06,440 --> 00:51:08,240
that are reentering.
1233
00:51:08,280 --> 00:51:09,560
- [Galactic Gal] Objects in low Earth orbit
1234
00:51:09,600 --> 00:51:12,160
naturally fall back down
after about 20 years
1235
00:51:12,240 --> 00:51:14,040
due to small atmospheric drag.
1236
00:51:14,080 --> 00:51:15,120
But space stations,
1237
00:51:15,160 --> 00:51:17,200
geo satellites or debris in higher orbits
1238
00:51:17,280 --> 00:51:19,440
will be in space for a much longer time.
1239
00:51:21,680 --> 00:51:23,240
- [Torsten] Some generals
don't seem to understand
1240
00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:25,320
the gravity of the situation.
1241
00:51:25,360 --> 00:51:28,000
In order to show off the
fire prowess and accuracy,
1242
00:51:29,400 --> 00:51:32,440
they've created even
more debris on purpose.
1243
00:51:32,480 --> 00:51:36,160
- Space junk from a Russian
anti-satellite weapons test
1244
00:51:36,200 --> 00:51:38,560
is threatening seven astronauts
1245
00:51:38,640 --> 00:51:40,800
aboard the International Space Station.
1246
00:51:40,840 --> 00:51:42,920
- In the middle of that test
in an immediate aftermath,
1247
00:51:42,960 --> 00:51:44,640
we knew that there was a debris cloud
1248
00:51:44,680 --> 00:51:46,760
in the vicinity of the
International Space Station,
1249
00:51:46,800 --> 00:51:48,160
but the data doesn't come in that fast.
1250
00:51:48,240 --> 00:51:50,160
And so trying to understand
1251
00:51:50,200 --> 00:51:52,120
the immediate danger to the astronauts
1252
00:51:52,160 --> 00:51:53,560
was not easy to do.
1253
00:51:53,640 --> 00:51:54,600
- [Torsten] And the irony is,
1254
00:51:54,640 --> 00:51:55,840
I think there were Russian astronauts at-
1255
00:51:55,880 --> 00:51:57,080
- Two of the seven.
1256
00:51:57,120 --> 00:51:58,280
Yeah, absolutely.
1257
00:51:58,320 --> 00:52:00,440
And of course there's sort
of the plausible deniability.
1258
00:52:00,480 --> 00:52:01,720
"Oh, they were never in risk."
1259
00:52:01,800 --> 00:52:03,480
And the reality is, we didn't know.
1260
00:52:03,520 --> 00:52:05,080
- The test has so far generated
1261
00:52:05,120 --> 00:52:08,920
over 1,500 pieces of
trackable orbital debris
1262
00:52:08,960 --> 00:52:10,880
and hundreds of thousands of pieces
1263
00:52:10,920 --> 00:52:13,040
of smaller orbital debris
1264
00:52:13,080 --> 00:52:15,560
that now threaten the
interests of all nations.
1265
00:52:15,600 --> 00:52:17,360
- [Torsten] I know that also the US
1266
00:52:17,400 --> 00:52:20,640
has done similar tests
in the '50s and '60s.
1267
00:52:20,680 --> 00:52:21,520
- Sure.
1268
00:52:21,600 --> 00:52:22,640
You know, honestly,
1269
00:52:22,680 --> 00:52:26,320
the last test that we
did, really, was in 1985.
1270
00:52:26,360 --> 00:52:28,360
We shot a satellite, and then we said,
1271
00:52:28,400 --> 00:52:30,520
"We don't think we're
going to do that anymore."
1272
00:52:30,600 --> 00:52:31,480
- [Torsten] That all doesn't matter
1273
00:52:31,520 --> 00:52:33,840
if China or Russia doesn't comply with any
1274
00:52:33,880 --> 00:52:36,520
of what you guys are talking
about here today, right?
1275
00:52:36,560 --> 00:52:38,640
- So what the Chinese choose to do,
1276
00:52:38,680 --> 00:52:42,400
what the Russians do today,
that that's on them, all right?
1277
00:52:42,480 --> 00:52:46,680
We know that they did the
Russian ASAT test, right?
1278
00:52:46,720 --> 00:52:50,640
That was completely,
completely inappropriate.
1279
00:52:52,640 --> 00:52:54,520
- [Torsten] Experts estimate
that there are more than
1280
00:52:54,600 --> 00:52:57,800
a hundred million pieces that
are way too small to detect.
1281
00:52:57,840 --> 00:53:00,000
Plus, even for the medium
sized objects, we have a problem
1282
00:53:00,080 --> 00:53:03,160
because we don't know
how they tumble and spin.
1283
00:53:04,680 --> 00:53:06,320
- Things move a certain way
1284
00:53:06,360 --> 00:53:09,480
mostly due to gravity or
curvature of space-time.
1285
00:53:09,520 --> 00:53:11,560
But then also, there's everything else
1286
00:53:11,600 --> 00:53:14,000
about how the sun is exerting forces
1287
00:53:14,040 --> 00:53:15,000
and pressures on objects.
1288
00:53:15,040 --> 00:53:17,880
And we are hindered
in our ability to predict
1289
00:53:17,920 --> 00:53:21,520
where these things are gonna
be at some point in the future.
1290
00:53:21,560 --> 00:53:22,680
- [Torsten] Okay, to recap,
1291
00:53:22,720 --> 00:53:26,320
this garbage grows
exponentially and travels fast.
1292
00:53:26,360 --> 00:53:27,760
Deliberate or accidental crashes
1293
00:53:27,800 --> 00:53:29,480
can cause cascading effects.
1294
00:53:29,520 --> 00:53:31,960
And to make things even worse,
1295
00:53:32,000 --> 00:53:34,880
we don't even know where
most of it is in time and space.
1296
00:53:36,960 --> 00:53:38,560
No matter how much I squint,
1297
00:53:38,600 --> 00:53:40,680
I get the remote sense
that solutions need to start
1298
00:53:40,720 --> 00:53:42,120
with better data.
1299
00:53:42,160 --> 00:53:45,520
Some already work on
improving situational awareness.
1300
00:53:45,600 --> 00:53:48,000
- So at Privateer, it's a platform company
1301
00:53:48,040 --> 00:53:52,080
co-founded by myself, Steve
Wozniak, and Alex Fielding.
1302
00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:55,240
Just like an iPhone is a
platform that has apps,
1303
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:58,040
we would love to have
people from across humanity
1304
00:53:58,080 --> 00:54:00,000
exposed to the data and information
1305
00:54:00,040 --> 00:54:01,480
in Privateer's platform.
1306
00:54:02,880 --> 00:54:04,520
- [Torsten] Another company, LeoLabs,
1307
00:54:04,560 --> 00:54:05,640
is already generating
1308
00:54:05,680 --> 00:54:08,120
a billion conjunction alerts per month.
1309
00:54:08,160 --> 00:54:09,400
But even with perfect vision,
1310
00:54:09,480 --> 00:54:12,120
you still have to maneuver
to safety when necessary.
1311
00:54:13,560 --> 00:54:15,760
Eutelsat is one of the
most important companies
1312
00:54:15,840 --> 00:54:16,680
in this field.
1313
00:54:16,720 --> 00:54:20,040
We got exclusive access to
this mission control center.
1314
00:54:20,080 --> 00:54:22,120
With a recent acquisition of OneWeb,
1315
00:54:22,200 --> 00:54:25,680
this 40-year-old European
company is taking on Starlink.
1316
00:54:27,240 --> 00:54:29,480
Eutelsat wants to bridge the digital divide
1317
00:54:29,520 --> 00:54:30,880
from multiple orbits.
1318
00:54:33,400 --> 00:54:35,440
- So if there is a
problem on the satellite,
1319
00:54:35,520 --> 00:54:39,360
this ground control system
will automatically detect
1320
00:54:39,400 --> 00:54:42,200
that there has been a
violation of the threshold
1321
00:54:42,240 --> 00:54:44,640
and we trigger an alarm.
1322
00:54:44,680 --> 00:54:47,920
We are performing
manual collision avoidance,
1323
00:54:47,960 --> 00:54:49,840
but it's most likely with other satellites
1324
00:54:49,880 --> 00:54:54,200
that are uncontrolled
in the stationary orbit.
1325
00:54:54,240 --> 00:54:56,160
- [Torsten] You said earlier
you need to react fast.
1326
00:54:56,200 --> 00:54:57,600
Are we 20 hours?
1327
00:54:57,640 --> 00:54:58,480
Are we talking seconds?
1328
00:54:58,560 --> 00:54:59,960
- No, no, we are talking in real time,
1329
00:55:00,000 --> 00:55:01,280
which means immediately.
1330
00:55:02,400 --> 00:55:03,280
Immediately.
1331
00:55:03,360 --> 00:55:04,760
It's less than every second.
1332
00:55:06,160 --> 00:55:07,960
- So you can imagine the resources
1333
00:55:08,000 --> 00:55:09,520
that you need to pull through
1334
00:55:09,560 --> 00:55:14,080
to have the right people here 24/7,
1335
00:55:14,160 --> 00:55:16,360
making sure that they are able to react.
1336
00:55:16,440 --> 00:55:17,600
It costs money.
1337
00:55:17,640 --> 00:55:19,320
- We don't have the right to make mistakes
1338
00:55:19,360 --> 00:55:20,720
because it could be fatal.
1339
00:55:22,240 --> 00:55:23,320
- But there's good news.
1340
00:55:23,400 --> 00:55:25,360
For starters, bureaucrats and lawyers,
1341
00:55:25,400 --> 00:55:26,440
yes, you heard right,
1342
00:55:26,520 --> 00:55:28,240
are starting to lay the groundwork.
1343
00:55:29,560 --> 00:55:31,000
- Hi, my name is Niklas Hedman,
1344
00:55:31,040 --> 00:55:32,560
and I'm now acting director
1345
00:55:32,640 --> 00:55:35,840
of the Office for Outer Space
Affairs of the United Nations.
1346
00:55:35,880 --> 00:55:37,360
If you create space debris,
1347
00:55:37,400 --> 00:55:39,040
you can be hit by it yourself.
1348
00:55:39,080 --> 00:55:41,560
You see, if you want a long-term investment
1349
00:55:41,640 --> 00:55:43,880
to really benefit your company,
1350
00:55:43,920 --> 00:55:46,320
then you have to act responsibly.
1351
00:55:46,360 --> 00:55:47,960
- 25 years ago, there was no...
1352
00:55:48,000 --> 00:55:51,360
It was just NASA, it was
just ESA, it was just JAXA,
1353
00:55:51,400 --> 00:55:53,440
the few countries that were launching.
1354
00:55:53,480 --> 00:55:56,760
Now you'll have a satellite
that's built in country A,
1355
00:55:56,800 --> 00:55:59,280
it's launched in country B,
1356
00:55:59,320 --> 00:56:01,840
it's being insured in country C,
1357
00:56:01,880 --> 00:56:04,000
it's getting a license from country D
1358
00:56:04,080 --> 00:56:05,800
and it's being managed by country E.
1359
00:56:05,840 --> 00:56:10,840
Just the basics of what is
up there, it's multinational.
1360
00:56:11,120 --> 00:56:14,480
- Space sustainability is fundamental.
1361
00:56:14,520 --> 00:56:19,000
We can't get all the
amazing benefits of space,
1362
00:56:19,040 --> 00:56:20,600
and they are truly amazing.
1363
00:56:20,640 --> 00:56:22,320
If space is so congested,
1364
00:56:22,360 --> 00:56:24,680
then it's too to be up there, right?
1365
00:56:24,720 --> 00:56:27,760
So there's nothing more
important to the world
1366
00:56:27,840 --> 00:56:30,720
than making sure that space
is sustainable to reform now
1367
00:56:30,760 --> 00:56:32,920
and for future generations.
1368
00:56:32,960 --> 00:56:34,720
So we've put that right at the top
1369
00:56:34,800 --> 00:56:37,320
of the priority list for the UK.
1370
00:56:37,360 --> 00:56:41,480
- For instance, in 2019,
this intergovernmental body
1371
00:56:41,520 --> 00:56:45,160
adopted the long-term
sustainability guidelines.
1372
00:56:45,200 --> 00:56:48,640
It took 10 years to
negotiate that instrument.
1373
00:56:48,720 --> 00:56:50,040
21 guidelines.
1374
00:56:53,320 --> 00:56:55,240
- The Vienna spirit is the idea
1375
00:56:55,320 --> 00:56:56,920
that even though things may be tensed
1376
00:56:56,960 --> 00:56:58,600
outside the negotiating room,
1377
00:56:58,680 --> 00:57:01,960
that you come together
and that you compromise
1378
00:57:02,040 --> 00:57:04,360
and you do it for the good of the goal,
1379
00:57:04,400 --> 00:57:06,520
which is either nuclear safeguards
1380
00:57:06,560 --> 00:57:10,000
or the peaceful use of outer space.
1381
00:57:10,040 --> 00:57:12,920
- [Torsten] But new space
companies like to move fast
1382
00:57:12,960 --> 00:57:15,080
and you guys are pretty
slow at getting anything done.
1383
00:57:15,120 --> 00:57:15,920
No?
1384
00:57:15,960 --> 00:57:16,760
- We are slow.
1385
00:57:16,800 --> 00:57:21,160
However, there is no
other consensus platform
1386
00:57:21,200 --> 00:57:23,280
that deals with these issues in the world.
1387
00:57:24,160 --> 00:57:25,880
- [Torsten] Meanwhile,
the first fuel stations
1388
00:57:25,920 --> 00:57:28,560
on the orbital highways
already planned and funded.
1389
00:57:29,520 --> 00:57:33,200
- So a very large percentage
of satellites, well over 50%,
1390
00:57:33,240 --> 00:57:34,560
they reached the end of their life
1391
00:57:34,600 --> 00:57:36,120
because they ran out of fuel.
1392
00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:38,280
Not because their hardware is obsolete
1393
00:57:38,320 --> 00:57:40,160
or, you know, something
else happened to them.
1394
00:57:40,200 --> 00:57:42,400
It's because they simply
just ran out of fuel.
1395
00:57:42,440 --> 00:57:44,320
- [Torsten] No one would
ever leave their car stranded
1396
00:57:44,360 --> 00:57:45,440
if it ran out of fuel.
1397
00:57:45,480 --> 00:57:47,320
So extending the life of these spacecraft
1398
00:57:47,400 --> 00:57:49,440
sounds like a no brainer to me.
1399
00:57:49,480 --> 00:57:50,920
There are already test missions
1400
00:57:51,000 --> 00:57:53,080
on the way to power up some probes.
1401
00:57:54,320 --> 00:57:56,800
- Cars, airplanes, washing machines,
1402
00:57:56,840 --> 00:58:00,200
everything is serviced after it gets sold.
1403
00:58:00,240 --> 00:58:02,040
Satellites aren't.
1404
00:58:02,080 --> 00:58:03,120
Satellites are launched,
1405
00:58:03,160 --> 00:58:05,080
and there's no intention to service them.
1406
00:58:05,120 --> 00:58:07,400
Once they launch, they're gone.
1407
00:58:07,440 --> 00:58:08,560
You're not going to see them again.
1408
00:58:08,640 --> 00:58:09,800
That's going to change.
1409
00:58:11,160 --> 00:58:14,160
- We are launching our first
fuel demonstration mission
1410
00:58:14,200 --> 00:58:15,680
to prove out the refueling port
1411
00:58:15,720 --> 00:58:17,920
and to prove out the fuel transfer
1412
00:58:18,000 --> 00:58:20,160
so that we can start
refueling our customers.
1413
00:58:20,200 --> 00:58:22,920
- So the way you've
been selling me this is,
1414
00:58:22,960 --> 00:58:25,400
you are solving one of the biggest issues
1415
00:58:25,440 --> 00:58:27,280
in the space industry,
1416
00:58:27,360 --> 00:58:29,200
but what you actually have at the moment
1417
00:58:29,240 --> 00:58:31,480
is just a 500 gram little widget.
1418
00:58:31,560 --> 00:58:33,280
Isn't it a little bit too much hype?
1419
00:58:33,320 --> 00:58:34,120
- No, not at all.
1420
00:58:34,160 --> 00:58:37,360
So we have been baselined already in 2022
1421
00:58:37,400 --> 00:58:39,600
on four Department of Defense satellites,
1422
00:58:39,640 --> 00:58:41,680
and then 91 commercial satellites as well.
1423
00:58:41,720 --> 00:58:44,200
So there's already a huge demand for it.
1424
00:58:44,240 --> 00:58:45,680
- [Torsten] That's some
real customer traction
1425
00:58:45,720 --> 00:58:47,200
for this startup right there.
1426
00:58:48,240 --> 00:58:51,040
- So today, absolutely zero satellites
1427
00:58:51,080 --> 00:58:54,320
that are in geosynchronous
orbit have refueling capability.
1428
00:58:54,360 --> 00:58:56,240
- [Torsten] But not everyone is convinced.
1429
00:58:56,280 --> 00:58:57,960
- In fact, in any orbit,
1430
00:58:58,000 --> 00:59:00,680
no satellites have refueling capability.
1431
00:59:00,720 --> 00:59:02,840
- [Torsten] Space logistics
is an ambitious entity
1432
00:59:02,880 --> 00:59:06,400
inside a mega corporation
of 90,000 employees.
1433
00:59:06,480 --> 00:59:08,000
Welcome to what some call
1434
00:59:08,040 --> 00:59:10,800
the military industrial complex, old space.
1435
00:59:10,840 --> 00:59:14,120
- Yeah, so Northrop Grumman
has quite a long history
1436
00:59:14,160 --> 00:59:16,240
in aerospace industry,
1437
00:59:16,320 --> 00:59:18,640
especially in space actually providing
1438
00:59:18,720 --> 00:59:22,000
some of the key elements
landed men on the moon.
1439
00:59:22,040 --> 00:59:23,200
- [Announcer] The Eagle has landed.
1440
00:59:23,240 --> 00:59:25,000
- Back in the 1960s,
1441
00:59:25,040 --> 00:59:27,320
I deorbited dozens of spacecraft,
1442
00:59:27,360 --> 00:59:29,840
and I always felt like such a grave digger
1443
00:59:29,880 --> 00:59:31,320
every time I was pushing
1444
00:59:31,360 --> 00:59:33,800
one of those perfectly
good satellites out to service
1445
00:59:33,840 --> 00:59:35,840
simply because it ran out of fuel.
1446
00:59:35,880 --> 00:59:37,520
But we don't have to do that anymore
1447
00:59:37,560 --> 00:59:39,560
with the MEV-1 and MEV-2
1448
00:59:39,600 --> 00:59:42,480
that can extend the
life of those satellites.
1449
00:59:42,520 --> 00:59:44,640
- [Torsten] The big
idea, instead of refueling,
1450
00:59:44,680 --> 00:59:46,640
why not simply attach as a jet pack
1451
00:59:46,680 --> 00:59:48,000
and take over control?
1452
00:59:49,600 --> 00:59:50,640
You just mentioned geo,
1453
00:59:50,680 --> 00:59:53,040
and I thought all the actions in LEO.
1454
00:59:53,080 --> 00:59:55,800
- Yeah, well, geo is where the money is.
1455
00:59:55,840 --> 00:59:58,320
And so it's very exciting after 19 years
1456
00:59:58,360 --> 00:59:59,920
to be sitting in this control center,
1457
00:59:59,960 --> 01:00:03,760
seeing that Intelsat 901 coming
up very close on the screen,
1458
01:00:03,840 --> 01:00:06,920
full size, being right
there in front of us,
1459
01:00:06,960 --> 01:00:09,160
knowing that we're now
docking to that satellite
1460
01:00:09,240 --> 01:00:10,240
and extending the life.
1461
01:00:10,320 --> 01:00:12,240
Something we never dreamed of 20 years ago
1462
01:00:12,280 --> 01:00:13,200
when we first launched it.
1463
01:00:13,240 --> 01:00:16,160
- [Torsten] Is it possible
to do this with any satellite?
1464
01:00:16,200 --> 01:00:18,840
- So those two key interfacing features,
1465
01:00:18,880 --> 01:00:21,680
the liquid apogee engine
and the launch adapter ring,
1466
01:00:21,720 --> 01:00:23,600
are present on approximately 80%
1467
01:00:23,640 --> 01:00:26,480
of all satellites in geosynchronous orbit.
1468
01:00:26,520 --> 01:00:30,520
And it should be compatible
with nearly all of those.
1469
01:00:30,600 --> 01:00:32,920
- [Torsten] Life extension
services for satellites
1470
01:00:32,960 --> 01:00:35,520
are an important part
of space sustainability.
1471
01:00:36,480 --> 01:00:38,360
Removing pieces of debris safely
1472
01:00:38,400 --> 01:00:39,960
is another even bigger challenge
1473
01:00:40,000 --> 01:00:42,040
that needs to be confronted head on.
1474
01:00:42,120 --> 01:00:44,120
- Our tagline is the space sweepers, right?
1475
01:00:44,160 --> 01:00:45,600
So we like to kind of
think about, you know,
1476
01:00:45,640 --> 01:00:48,600
in the same way if your car
breaks down on the roadside,
1477
01:00:48,640 --> 01:00:51,520
you know, you call up
the car breakdown service
1478
01:00:51,560 --> 01:00:53,480
and they'll come and
take it off the highway.
1479
01:00:53,520 --> 01:00:56,200
We are looking at doing
the same thing with satellites.
1480
01:00:56,280 --> 01:00:57,920
- Astroscale's plan is to maneuver
1481
01:00:58,000 --> 01:01:01,360
close to defunct satellites and grab them.
1482
01:01:01,440 --> 01:01:03,960
With almost $400
million of venture capital,
1483
01:01:04,000 --> 01:01:06,160
they might actually be able to pull it off.
1484
01:01:08,680 --> 01:01:09,520
If you think about it,
1485
01:01:09,560 --> 01:01:12,040
this is the ultimate
tragedy of the commons.
1486
01:01:12,080 --> 01:01:14,480
Sure, there's exciting
technology on the horizon,
1487
01:01:14,520 --> 01:01:15,640
but let's be honest.
1488
01:01:15,680 --> 01:01:16,480
At the moment,
1489
01:01:16,520 --> 01:01:18,680
there are no binding
international rules in place
1490
01:01:18,720 --> 01:01:20,880
and no punishment for polluters.
1491
01:01:20,920 --> 01:01:22,880
We can't even keep the
rubbish off of our street
1492
01:01:22,920 --> 01:01:25,760
or recycle our consumer electronic devices.
1493
01:01:27,280 --> 01:01:28,120
But when small sats
1494
01:01:28,160 --> 01:01:30,000
get cheaper and cheaper to make and deploy,
1495
01:01:30,040 --> 01:01:32,000
they are also cheaper to replace.
1496
01:01:33,440 --> 01:01:36,240
If reuse, reduce, recycle is more expensive
1497
01:01:36,280 --> 01:01:38,400
than litter and relaunch,
1498
01:01:38,440 --> 01:01:42,000
then are we becoming a
space fairing throwaway society?
1499
01:01:43,080 --> 01:01:46,280
Probably better to be
responsible stewards of near Earth.
1500
01:01:48,000 --> 01:01:50,200
- I'd like to think that in 10, 20 years,
1501
01:01:50,280 --> 01:01:53,000
we look back and we say,
1502
01:01:53,040 --> 01:01:55,680
"Glad we did it just in the nick of time."
1503
01:02:01,440 --> 01:02:04,680
(spirited music)
1504
01:02:04,720 --> 01:02:07,360
- So I work at NASA Johnson Space Center
1505
01:02:07,440 --> 01:02:12,440
and we are what is called the
Space Vehicle Mockup Facility.
1506
01:02:12,680 --> 01:02:15,040
I am currently the deputy program manager
1507
01:02:15,080 --> 01:02:19,080
for the Commercial LEO
Development Program here at NASA.
1508
01:02:20,440 --> 01:02:22,280
- [Torsten] NASA's
grants are the rocket fuel
1509
01:02:22,320 --> 01:02:24,360
for the privatization of space.
1510
01:02:25,280 --> 01:02:26,760
After the retirement of the ISS,
1511
01:02:26,800 --> 01:02:29,400
there will be benefits to becoming a user
1512
01:02:29,440 --> 01:02:31,960
rather than an owner of a space station.
1513
01:02:32,040 --> 01:02:35,680
- It dries down costs for NASA
so we can take those funds
1514
01:02:35,720 --> 01:02:38,160
and apply it to exploration.
1515
01:02:38,200 --> 01:02:41,240
The exploration of the
moon and exploration of Mars,
1516
01:02:41,280 --> 01:02:44,320
which is really our main goal.
1517
01:02:44,400 --> 01:02:47,720
400 million over the next several years,
1518
01:02:47,760 --> 01:02:49,320
that is NASA's investment
1519
01:02:49,360 --> 01:02:52,360
in development of these
commercial space stations.
1520
01:02:52,400 --> 01:02:56,920
And beyond that, we
will be procuring services
1521
01:02:56,960 --> 01:03:00,280
from these commercial space stations
1522
01:03:00,320 --> 01:03:04,640
at the tune of about one
and a half billion dollars.
1523
01:03:04,680 --> 01:03:06,360
- Three stations are in the running.
1524
01:03:06,400 --> 01:03:07,840
We've already met Blue Origin.
1525
01:03:07,920 --> 01:03:10,200
They're also designing a
mixed use business park
1526
01:03:10,240 --> 01:03:12,720
called Orbital Reef for a crew of 10.
1527
01:03:12,760 --> 01:03:15,600
Axiom is one of those
companies building such a station.
1528
01:03:15,640 --> 01:03:18,080
They hired this guy to
make it commercially viable.
1529
01:03:18,120 --> 01:03:19,360
I'm, sorry, you have a fly.
1530
01:03:19,400 --> 01:03:20,600
Yeah, it's...
1531
01:03:21,880 --> 01:03:22,680
Got it.
1532
01:03:22,720 --> 01:03:23,520
- Very nice.
1533
01:03:23,560 --> 01:03:24,320
- [Torsten] One shot.
1534
01:03:24,360 --> 01:03:25,440
We don't fool around here.
1535
01:03:25,480 --> 01:03:28,520
- I'm not a rocket scientist
and I'm not a billionaire yet.
1536
01:03:28,560 --> 01:03:31,680
I got my start in technology,
software technology.
1537
01:03:31,720 --> 01:03:34,400
I was a startup founder for 10 years,
1538
01:03:34,440 --> 01:03:37,360
three different companies,
web and mobile apps.
1539
01:03:37,400 --> 01:03:40,000
And then I was working
at Google for many years.
1540
01:03:40,040 --> 01:03:42,800
And Axiom Space was
my first angel investment.
1541
01:03:42,840 --> 01:03:45,040
So in a few years, you'll
see our first module dock.
1542
01:03:45,120 --> 01:03:46,480
It's a habitat.
1543
01:03:46,520 --> 01:03:48,480
Few months after that,
the second module will dock.
1544
01:03:48,520 --> 01:03:50,000
Also a habitat.
1545
01:03:50,040 --> 01:03:52,000
Then our lab, our Earth observatory,
1546
01:03:52,040 --> 01:03:53,280
and then our power tower.
1547
01:03:55,440 --> 01:03:58,560
(spirited music)
1548
01:03:58,600 --> 01:04:00,400
- We're building the replacement
1549
01:04:00,440 --> 01:04:03,800
to the International Space
Station called Star Lab.
1550
01:04:03,840 --> 01:04:06,200
And that really validated,
I think, our model,
1551
01:04:06,240 --> 01:04:09,240
which is to acquire great companies,
1552
01:04:09,280 --> 01:04:13,120
invest in technologies,
and demonstrate our ability
1553
01:04:13,160 --> 01:04:15,280
to build infrastructure and space.
1554
01:04:15,360 --> 01:04:17,600
- [Torsten] The European
Space Agency and Airbus,
1555
01:04:17,640 --> 01:04:19,920
the world's largest
manufacturer of airplanes,
1556
01:04:19,960 --> 01:04:21,960
have joined as partners.
1557
01:04:22,000 --> 01:04:25,400
Airbus is also a defense
and space prime contractor.
1558
01:04:25,440 --> 01:04:27,680
Starlab will be half the size of the ISS,
1559
01:04:27,720 --> 01:04:31,040
but will fit nicely into
a single Starship rocket.
1560
01:04:31,080 --> 01:04:34,520
Northrop Grumman will
also provide cargo supply.
1561
01:04:34,560 --> 01:04:36,520
NASA might have
provided the initial funding,
1562
01:04:36,560 --> 01:04:38,200
but surely won't be the only customer
1563
01:04:38,240 --> 01:04:40,120
on these private space stations.
1564
01:04:40,200 --> 01:04:41,920
The market is expanding.
1565
01:04:42,000 --> 01:04:43,440
- So I think there's now 60 plus
1566
01:04:43,480 --> 01:04:45,040
space agencies in the world.
1567
01:04:45,120 --> 01:04:47,360
Pretty much every major country has one.
1568
01:04:47,400 --> 01:04:51,160
And they're starting to be
well funded and well supported.
1569
01:04:51,200 --> 01:04:55,720
And yeah, it's a renaissance
for those space agencies.
1570
01:04:55,760 --> 01:04:57,880
But we're still scoping out our designs.
1571
01:04:57,920 --> 01:04:58,880
I think we'll be,
1572
01:04:58,920 --> 01:05:01,400
you know, in the
single billions, certainly.
1573
01:05:01,440 --> 01:05:02,800
It's hard for me to say for sure,
1574
01:05:02,840 --> 01:05:05,320
but it's gonna be several orders
of magnitude less expensive
1575
01:05:05,360 --> 01:05:07,960
than the International Space Station.
1576
01:05:08,040 --> 01:05:09,800
- [Torsten] Still, financing these projects
1577
01:05:09,840 --> 01:05:11,360
will be a massive lift.
1578
01:05:11,400 --> 01:05:13,640
Axiom's latest investment
round transcended borders
1579
01:05:13,720 --> 01:05:16,320
and included capital from a Saudi bank
1580
01:05:16,360 --> 01:05:18,800
and a South Korean healthcare company.
1581
01:05:18,840 --> 01:05:21,280
- Axiom will be a trillion dollar company.
1582
01:05:21,320 --> 01:05:22,120
How?
1583
01:05:22,200 --> 01:05:23,880
I'll tell you the same
answer I gave my board
1584
01:05:23,920 --> 01:05:25,520
three weeks into my job.
1585
01:05:25,560 --> 01:05:29,120
I don't know, but I'm certain
we're gonna figure it out.
1586
01:05:29,160 --> 01:05:31,360
- Clearly, there's a gold
rush happening right now.
1587
01:05:31,400 --> 01:05:33,600
Maybe someone is already
building a space hotel
1588
01:05:33,640 --> 01:05:35,760
like the one I read about as a kid.
1589
01:05:35,800 --> 01:05:38,160
(gentle music)
1590
01:05:38,200 --> 01:05:39,760
- Well, we signed a
partnership with Hilton.
1591
01:05:39,840 --> 01:05:43,520
And as you reimagine
human habitation in space,
1592
01:05:43,560 --> 01:05:45,440
why not go to a habitation expert?
1593
01:05:45,480 --> 01:05:48,720
So that's one strength that
Hilton brings to the table.
1594
01:05:48,760 --> 01:05:50,800
- [Torsten] I don't know how
many stars this hotel will have
1595
01:05:50,880 --> 01:05:52,000
in the Hitchhiker's guide,
1596
01:05:52,080 --> 01:05:54,160
but I'll take the penthouses
with the views please.
1597
01:05:54,200 --> 01:05:56,320
- Second strength is they're
spending a lot of money
1598
01:05:56,360 --> 01:05:59,520
researching things like
anti-microbial technology.
1599
01:06:01,120 --> 01:06:04,240
- [Torsten] Finally, some
peace and quiet, a real getaway.
1600
01:06:04,280 --> 01:06:05,240
In the space elevator,
1601
01:06:05,280 --> 01:06:07,680
I imagine how my stay would be like.
1602
01:06:07,720 --> 01:06:09,560
For once, I'll hit the gym before sunrise,
1603
01:06:09,600 --> 01:06:11,800
and finally, will improve my bench press.
1604
01:06:11,880 --> 01:06:13,680
Here, I'll even weigh less.
1605
01:06:13,720 --> 01:06:16,120
- And it's also a brand
that everyone knows.
1606
01:06:16,160 --> 01:06:18,120
And I think it lends credibility
1607
01:06:18,160 --> 01:06:20,600
to the fact that this is happening.
1608
01:06:20,640 --> 01:06:21,880
- [Torsten] I'll have my Ecuadorian coffee
1609
01:06:21,960 --> 01:06:23,080
just over the equator
1610
01:06:23,120 --> 01:06:26,000
and eat my yogurt while spying
on the Great Wall of China.
1611
01:06:27,280 --> 01:06:29,360
Oh, it's full of stars.
1612
01:06:29,400 --> 01:06:31,120
- Well, it's gonna be expensive,
1613
01:06:31,160 --> 01:06:32,840
I hate to break it to you, Torsten.
1614
01:06:32,880 --> 01:06:34,040
It's not gonna be...
1615
01:06:34,080 --> 01:06:35,280
It's not gonna be cheap.
1616
01:06:36,360 --> 01:06:38,040
- It's definitely going here.
1617
01:06:38,080 --> 01:06:39,000
When you're hungry,
1618
01:06:39,040 --> 01:06:41,680
there is no bigger food desert than space.
1619
01:06:41,720 --> 01:06:43,920
A place where you cannot waste anything.
1620
01:06:43,960 --> 01:06:46,480
So how can humans live here sustainably?
1621
01:06:47,880 --> 01:06:49,320
Paris-based, Interstellar Lab,
1622
01:06:49,360 --> 01:06:51,400
won the NASA Deep Space Food Challenge
1623
01:06:51,480 --> 01:06:53,400
for their modular system Nucleus.
1624
01:06:53,440 --> 01:06:54,520
Just add water.
1625
01:06:55,520 --> 01:06:57,720
- So we are using actually the CO2
1626
01:06:57,760 --> 01:07:01,040
that is produced by
mushroom to feed the plants.
1627
01:07:01,080 --> 01:07:03,920
The plants are producing
oxygen that goes into the insects
1628
01:07:03,960 --> 01:07:05,520
and the mushroom box.
1629
01:07:05,560 --> 01:07:08,080
And we use that inedible part of the plants
1630
01:07:08,120 --> 01:07:09,280
to feed the insects,
1631
01:07:09,360 --> 01:07:11,440
which create the
substrate for the mushroom.
1632
01:07:11,480 --> 01:07:13,080
So it's kind of a small ecosystem
1633
01:07:13,120 --> 01:07:15,280
just divided in different box
1634
01:07:15,320 --> 01:07:16,920
but trying to close the loop.
1635
01:07:18,880 --> 01:07:19,680
- [Torsten] It turns out
1636
01:07:19,720 --> 01:07:21,200
that you need about 55 square meters
1637
01:07:21,240 --> 01:07:25,240
to sustain one human for
one year with food and oxygen.
1638
01:07:25,320 --> 01:07:27,000
Welcome to Barbara's (indistinct).
1639
01:07:28,920 --> 01:07:30,440
Personally, I'm still undecided
1640
01:07:30,480 --> 01:07:33,040
about drinking recycled
urine and eating crickets.
1641
01:07:33,120 --> 01:07:36,000
A bit hard to swallow,
but I'm certainly a big fan
1642
01:07:36,040 --> 01:07:37,240
of building a space business
1643
01:07:37,280 --> 01:07:39,880
by first selling to terrestrial clients.
1644
01:07:39,960 --> 01:07:40,960
- What we're doing now
1645
01:07:41,000 --> 01:07:43,640
is we're working with very big
natural ingredients company,
1646
01:07:43,680 --> 01:07:46,600
cosmetic company, food companies as well.
1647
01:07:46,640 --> 01:07:50,680
And we're growing rare
species or endangered species
1648
01:07:50,720 --> 01:07:53,040
or species that
traditionally are not growing,
1649
01:07:53,080 --> 01:07:55,720
you know, where you live inside the bubble.
1650
01:07:55,760 --> 01:07:57,680
And so we are helping
actually the food industry
1651
01:07:57,720 --> 01:07:59,400
and natural ingredient industry
1652
01:07:59,440 --> 01:08:01,040
growing plants in a more sustainable way
1653
01:08:01,080 --> 01:08:02,800
because we use less water,
1654
01:08:02,840 --> 01:08:04,480
because we scrub CO2,
1655
01:08:04,520 --> 01:08:06,680
because it's a sealed bubble
1656
01:08:06,720 --> 01:08:07,760
and it was designed
1657
01:08:07,800 --> 01:08:10,440
with this space constrained
engineering approach
1658
01:08:10,480 --> 01:08:12,280
where you need to minimize the input
1659
01:08:12,320 --> 01:08:13,800
and maximize the output.
1660
01:08:15,680 --> 01:08:18,160
- There was a technique that was developed
1661
01:08:18,240 --> 01:08:20,480
for freeze drying food,
1662
01:08:20,520 --> 01:08:23,520
which is actually the
same technique we use now
1663
01:08:23,560 --> 01:08:25,480
for food onboard the ISS.
1664
01:08:25,520 --> 01:08:28,320
But it's a technique
that we use on Earth too.
1665
01:08:28,360 --> 01:08:30,760
So that is a direct spinoff from,
1666
01:08:30,800 --> 01:08:33,520
you know, having to solve that problem
1667
01:08:33,600 --> 01:08:35,720
for the Apollo astronaut.
1668
01:08:35,760 --> 01:08:37,840
- [Torsten] It's doubtful
that the Cold War taxpayers
1669
01:08:37,880 --> 01:08:39,160
beating the Soviets to the moon
1670
01:08:39,200 --> 01:08:42,200
ever thought that their grandkids
would use space race tech
1671
01:08:42,240 --> 01:08:44,360
to feed their families today.
1672
01:08:44,400 --> 01:08:45,920
- The International Space Station
1673
01:08:45,960 --> 01:08:48,640
is a beacon of international collaboration.
1674
01:08:48,680 --> 01:08:51,640
And we have many nations, you know,
1675
01:08:51,680 --> 01:08:54,240
who send their astronauts.
1676
01:08:54,280 --> 01:08:56,240
They eat together, they work together.
1677
01:08:56,280 --> 01:08:59,040
We have many nations
who send their experiments.
1678
01:08:59,080 --> 01:09:01,280
School children send experiments
1679
01:09:01,320 --> 01:09:02,760
to the International Space Station
1680
01:09:02,800 --> 01:09:06,840
for astronauts to
conduct research for them.
1681
01:09:06,880 --> 01:09:09,520
And this spans the globe.
1682
01:09:09,560 --> 01:09:10,440
- [Torsten] To fact check this,
1683
01:09:10,480 --> 01:09:12,440
I went down under to Australia
1684
01:09:12,480 --> 01:09:16,120
- And the high school sends
us a team of their students,
1685
01:09:16,160 --> 01:09:17,440
about six students,
1686
01:09:17,480 --> 01:09:20,600
and those students work
with our university students
1687
01:09:20,640 --> 01:09:22,360
who are mentors to them.
1688
01:09:22,440 --> 01:09:23,760
They have to research what they think
1689
01:09:23,800 --> 01:09:27,200
would be an important
microgravity related experiment.
1690
01:09:27,240 --> 01:09:28,400
And they research that,
1691
01:09:28,440 --> 01:09:31,320
they design their own
experiment, they test it here,
1692
01:09:31,360 --> 01:09:34,760
and then they fly it to the
International Space Station.
1693
01:09:34,800 --> 01:09:36,880
- Last year, they decided
to send yogurt to space
1694
01:09:36,920 --> 01:09:39,520
because probiotics are
incredibly important for your gut.
1695
01:09:39,560 --> 01:09:41,800
Gut health in space is incredibly important
1696
01:09:41,880 --> 01:09:43,480
and not well understood yet.
1697
01:09:43,520 --> 01:09:47,080
So they hit several nails
on the head with their idea.
1698
01:09:47,120 --> 01:09:49,320
- So I think we were
just putting milk samples
1699
01:09:49,360 --> 01:09:51,080
in an incubator,
1700
01:09:51,120 --> 01:09:54,320
and then milk with yogurt
and milk with probiotics.
1701
01:09:54,360 --> 01:09:56,360
And we were seeing
like the bacterial strains
1702
01:09:56,400 --> 01:10:00,200
that would like develop over
time with different dilutions.
1703
01:10:00,240 --> 01:10:02,840
So from one tenth to one billionth?
1704
01:10:02,920 --> 01:10:03,680
- Yeah. - Yeah, I think so.
1705
01:10:03,720 --> 01:10:06,440
So we're gonna open up some of the vials
1706
01:10:06,480 --> 01:10:07,600
that have actually been to space
1707
01:10:07,640 --> 01:10:10,800
and we're gonna see like
the bacterial strains there.
1708
01:10:12,080 --> 01:10:13,800
- [Torsten] My high school
didn't catapult students
1709
01:10:13,840 --> 01:10:16,200
into a career in science quite like this.
1710
01:10:18,200 --> 01:10:20,560
- We actually just signed six agreements
1711
01:10:20,600 --> 01:10:22,240
with Latin American countries.
1712
01:10:22,320 --> 01:10:25,760
Everything from Mexico to
Columbia, even Costa Rica.
1713
01:10:25,800 --> 01:10:28,000
So you have all these emerging countries
1714
01:10:28,080 --> 01:10:30,760
that wanna have a space agency.
1715
01:10:30,840 --> 01:10:34,160
They want to have national
identity around space.
1716
01:10:34,200 --> 01:10:38,080
They see it as a way to inspire
students in STEM education.
1717
01:10:38,120 --> 01:10:39,480
- [Torsten] But how does this relate
1718
01:10:39,520 --> 01:10:42,440
to entirely new industries emerging?
1719
01:10:42,480 --> 01:10:43,800
- We can't say exactly,
1720
01:10:43,840 --> 01:10:46,840
well, what's gonna be the
next billion dollar industry?
1721
01:10:46,920 --> 01:10:47,680
Actually I can.
1722
01:10:47,760 --> 01:10:49,680
It's gonna be pharmaceuticals in space.
1723
01:10:50,520 --> 01:10:51,760
- [Torsten] Pharma giant, Merck,
1724
01:10:51,840 --> 01:10:54,280
known as MSD outside North America,
1725
01:10:54,320 --> 01:10:57,520
was founded at the end of the 19th century.
1726
01:10:57,600 --> 01:10:58,960
Merck has been able to develop
1727
01:10:59,000 --> 01:11:01,000
more pure formulations on orbit.
1728
01:11:02,160 --> 01:11:05,920
- Well, microgravity, the
particles remain suspended,
1729
01:11:05,960 --> 01:11:10,640
and therefore can grow more
perfect in all three dimensions.
1730
01:11:10,680 --> 01:11:13,440
- [Torsten] Which could help
improve cancer treatments.
1731
01:11:14,560 --> 01:11:17,800
- I think that these companies
miss the opportunities
1732
01:11:17,840 --> 01:11:20,280
in research and development.
1733
01:11:20,320 --> 01:11:23,800
Particle engineering, stem cell growth.
1734
01:11:23,840 --> 01:11:27,040
There's organs grown in space.
1735
01:11:27,080 --> 01:11:29,560
- Sounds like something
straight out of a sci-fi novel.
1736
01:11:29,640 --> 01:11:32,400
But why make anything
in space in the first place
1737
01:11:32,440 --> 01:11:34,840
if the rockets are getting elongated
1738
01:11:34,880 --> 01:11:36,480
and the shipping costs are falling?
1739
01:11:36,520 --> 01:11:38,640
Well, here's an example.
1740
01:11:38,680 --> 01:11:41,920
The European Space Agency
needs very powerful antenna,
1741
01:11:41,960 --> 01:11:43,600
and those need to be way longer
1742
01:11:43,680 --> 01:11:45,840
than even the biggest
pod bay doors are wide.
1743
01:11:45,880 --> 01:11:48,960
In the past, complicated
folding mechanisms were needed.
1744
01:11:50,160 --> 01:11:51,560
A little like an umbrella.
1745
01:11:51,600 --> 01:11:54,920
- Your spacecraft is
sitting nicely, so to speak,
1746
01:11:54,960 --> 01:11:57,400
in a microgravity environment.
1747
01:11:57,440 --> 01:11:59,240
So it doesn't need to be as strong
1748
01:11:59,280 --> 01:12:02,320
as what you would build on Earth.
1749
01:12:02,400 --> 01:12:04,400
So your structures can be lighter.
1750
01:12:04,440 --> 01:12:07,320
- What if we could make
materials up in space
1751
01:12:07,360 --> 01:12:11,160
that would be impossible to
produce back here on Earth?
1752
01:12:11,200 --> 01:12:14,000
- For example, optical
fibers with less defects
1753
01:12:14,040 --> 01:12:15,960
than what you would get on Earth.
1754
01:12:16,000 --> 01:12:18,880
Semiconductor materials with less defects,
1755
01:12:18,920 --> 01:12:21,560
metallic alloys, even superalloys,
1756
01:12:21,600 --> 01:12:25,960
the kind of alloys we use in
airplane engines, ceramics.
1757
01:12:28,760 --> 01:12:29,560
- [Speaker] People say,
1758
01:12:29,600 --> 01:12:30,840
"Well, there's not gonna be enough demand
1759
01:12:30,880 --> 01:12:33,720
to meet the launch capacity."
1760
01:12:33,760 --> 01:12:34,960
And I reject that.
1761
01:12:35,040 --> 01:12:38,600
I think capacity creates demand.
1762
01:12:38,640 --> 01:12:40,280
- Build it and they will come.
1763
01:12:40,320 --> 01:12:41,440
- Yes.
1764
01:12:41,480 --> 01:12:42,520
But in this case, it
really is true, Torsten,
1765
01:12:42,560 --> 01:12:45,120
because the limiting factor has been
1766
01:12:45,160 --> 01:12:48,160
essentially getting projects
through the NASA system,
1767
01:12:48,240 --> 01:12:51,800
astronaut time, and space manufacturing,
1768
01:12:51,840 --> 01:12:54,280
biopharma research, ag tech,
1769
01:12:54,320 --> 01:12:58,480
these are all leading edge
research projects and programs
1770
01:12:58,520 --> 01:12:59,720
that just need habitat.
1771
01:12:59,760 --> 01:13:01,040
They need more space.
1772
01:13:03,560 --> 01:13:05,480
- [Torsten] Before central
bankers could just print money
1773
01:13:05,520 --> 01:13:06,320
out of thin air,
1774
01:13:06,360 --> 01:13:09,680
whoever controlled the gold
mines would rule the lands.
1775
01:13:09,720 --> 01:13:11,040
History is full of stories
1776
01:13:11,080 --> 01:13:13,320
about explorers extending frontiers
1777
01:13:13,360 --> 01:13:15,560
and extracting wealth from new continents.
1778
01:13:15,600 --> 01:13:18,560
So perhaps it's time
to revisit a far out idea.
1779
01:13:20,240 --> 01:13:22,760
Recently, NASA and Japan's JAXA
1780
01:13:22,800 --> 01:13:24,400
have demonstrated the ability
1781
01:13:24,440 --> 01:13:27,520
to navigate to and land on asteroids.
1782
01:13:27,600 --> 01:13:29,000
Today I'm traveling light.
1783
01:13:29,040 --> 01:13:30,240
My little bird is taking me
1784
01:13:30,280 --> 01:13:32,760
to a Californian company
hunting for treasure.
1785
01:13:33,840 --> 01:13:36,040
- The amount of platinum
group metals out there
1786
01:13:36,120 --> 01:13:38,440
is in the trillions of dollars.
1787
01:13:38,480 --> 01:13:40,880
And that's just for a
couple of asteroids, right?
1788
01:13:40,920 --> 01:13:43,840
And we have millions
of asteroids out there.
1789
01:13:43,920 --> 01:13:45,640
So this is a lab prototype
1790
01:13:45,680 --> 01:13:47,920
of what we aim to build for space.
1791
01:13:50,320 --> 01:13:51,640
The vapors are ionized,
1792
01:13:51,720 --> 01:13:54,760
so they're positively charged
and they get accelerated.
1793
01:13:54,800 --> 01:13:58,480
So AstroForge is building a
vehicle that's gonna go out
1794
01:13:58,560 --> 01:14:00,360
and extract material from asteroids,
1795
01:14:00,400 --> 01:14:01,400
refine the material,
1796
01:14:01,440 --> 01:14:03,640
and bring that refined
material back to Earth.
1797
01:14:03,680 --> 01:14:07,120
If this is successful,
platinum will be as common
1798
01:14:07,160 --> 01:14:10,280
as aluminum or iron or nickel.
1799
01:14:10,320 --> 01:14:12,760
It would be a very common metal, right?
1800
01:14:12,800 --> 01:14:15,160
- How certain are you
that this survives launch
1801
01:14:15,240 --> 01:14:18,400
and the vibration, the
speed and the radiation?
1802
01:14:18,440 --> 01:14:20,800
To be clear, AstroForge
is currently ridesharing
1803
01:14:20,840 --> 01:14:23,160
a small experimental payload
1804
01:14:23,200 --> 01:14:25,200
with our friends from Exolaunch.
1805
01:14:25,240 --> 01:14:27,160
These first tests are to demonstrate
1806
01:14:27,200 --> 01:14:30,520
that refining platinum
and microgravity could work.
1807
01:14:30,600 --> 01:14:32,200
Two year long robotic roundtrip missions
1808
01:14:32,240 --> 01:14:34,760
are in the business plan
by the end of the decade.
1809
01:14:35,880 --> 01:14:37,800
- When we were doing Y Combinator,
1810
01:14:37,840 --> 01:14:41,040
we had a myriad of
investors wanting to invest
1811
01:14:41,080 --> 01:14:43,480
and throw money at the company.
1812
01:14:43,520 --> 01:14:46,360
- [Torsten] See, nothing is
truly scarce in this universe,
1813
01:14:46,440 --> 01:14:48,880
but you disapprove of
galactic gold diggers?
1814
01:14:48,960 --> 01:14:50,440
Personally I find parachuting
1815
01:14:50,520 --> 01:14:52,960
in platinum from outer
space pretty cyberpunk
1816
01:14:53,000 --> 01:14:55,840
and much more palatable than
obtaining it from rogue nations
1817
01:14:55,880 --> 01:14:59,000
or by children slaving
in underground mines.
1818
01:14:59,040 --> 01:14:59,840
Yep.
1819
01:14:59,880 --> 01:15:02,000
Yet again, we're touching
on geopolitical matters.
1820
01:15:03,040 --> 01:15:05,600
Some of these companies are now so huge
1821
01:15:05,640 --> 01:15:09,640
and the billionaire founders
behind them are so rich.
1822
01:15:09,720 --> 01:15:11,680
Do governments still matter
1823
01:15:11,760 --> 01:15:13,640
or is it all about commercial space?
1824
01:15:13,680 --> 01:15:14,640
- I mean, as a government employee,
1825
01:15:14,680 --> 01:15:16,280
I definitely have to say
the governments are still
1826
01:15:16,320 --> 01:15:19,480
very much involved in
kind of all aspects of this.
1827
01:15:19,520 --> 01:15:21,680
And an interesting aspect
of the outer space treaty,
1828
01:15:21,720 --> 01:15:23,800
which is really the foundational document
1829
01:15:23,880 --> 01:15:25,360
for international space law,
1830
01:15:25,440 --> 01:15:27,680
is that it states that
governments are responsible
1831
01:15:27,720 --> 01:15:30,400
for the activities of
their nationals in space.
1832
01:15:30,480 --> 01:15:32,200
- [Torsten] Apparently,
SpaceX does not want
1833
01:15:32,240 --> 01:15:33,120
to commit to these rules
1834
01:15:33,160 --> 01:15:35,800
when it comes to the free people of Mars.
1835
01:15:35,840 --> 01:15:39,040
If the planet's aligned,
we'll cover that in our sequel.
1836
01:15:39,120 --> 01:15:41,600
But let's not forget that
it's not a pale blue flag
1837
01:15:41,640 --> 01:15:43,600
for all mankind on the moon.
1838
01:15:43,640 --> 01:15:46,480
The American Eagle had landed.
1839
01:15:46,560 --> 01:15:48,880
- When Columbus crossed the Atlantic,
1840
01:15:48,960 --> 01:15:51,880
he was sent by Queen
Isabella and King Ferdinand.
1841
01:15:51,920 --> 01:15:53,560
There was some private investment in there,
1842
01:15:53,600 --> 01:15:56,040
but the motivation was geopolitical.
1843
01:15:56,080 --> 01:15:56,880
Okay?
1844
01:15:56,920 --> 01:16:00,240
And by the way, Queen Isabella didn't say,
1845
01:16:00,280 --> 01:16:04,120
"Oh, Chris, you know, when you come back
1846
01:16:04,160 --> 01:16:07,360
give us a slideshow of
the, you know, the plants
1847
01:16:07,400 --> 01:16:08,680
and the terrain."
1848
01:16:08,720 --> 01:16:11,680
No, it's like, "Here's a satchel of flags.
1849
01:16:11,720 --> 01:16:13,600
Plant them wherever you go."
1850
01:16:13,640 --> 01:16:15,280
- China and Russia
are very active in space.
1851
01:16:15,360 --> 01:16:16,880
The United States is very active in space.
1852
01:16:16,920 --> 01:16:17,840
A lot of countries are.
1853
01:16:17,880 --> 01:16:19,480
And I think the important thing
1854
01:16:19,560 --> 01:16:22,440
is that nations that are active
in space behave responsibly,
1855
01:16:22,480 --> 01:16:24,200
they behave sustainably.
1856
01:16:24,240 --> 01:16:26,760
- You know, for US-based
companies in general,
1857
01:16:26,800 --> 01:16:28,600
China's completely off limits,
1858
01:16:28,640 --> 01:16:30,440
really, for regulatory reasons.
1859
01:16:30,480 --> 01:16:32,240
What I see happening, Torsten,
1860
01:16:32,280 --> 01:16:35,160
is we're gonna have two
different space economies.
1861
01:16:35,200 --> 01:16:38,400
We're gonna have a Western,
US-led space economy,
1862
01:16:38,440 --> 01:16:41,800
and then you'll have a
Chinese-led space economy.
1863
01:16:41,840 --> 01:16:45,240
And I think those will be quite distinct
1864
01:16:45,280 --> 01:16:47,280
and I don't see a lot of overlap there.
1865
01:16:48,680 --> 01:16:49,480
- Hi.
1866
01:16:49,520 --> 01:16:50,280
Torsten, nice to meet you.
1867
01:16:50,320 --> 01:16:52,760
- I think there's a historical
perspective to be had here
1868
01:16:52,800 --> 01:16:55,120
because the way the Chinese understand
1869
01:16:55,160 --> 01:16:57,640
the history of the 18th, 19th, 20th century
1870
01:16:57,720 --> 01:17:00,600
is that China did not stand their ground
1871
01:17:00,640 --> 01:17:02,400
on the geopolitical scene.
1872
01:17:02,440 --> 01:17:04,160
And so it was the Western powers
1873
01:17:04,200 --> 01:17:08,680
that sort of established the
way the world works today.
1874
01:17:08,760 --> 01:17:09,960
- [Torsten] John has lived in the region
1875
01:17:10,000 --> 01:17:11,080
for half of his life
1876
01:17:11,160 --> 01:17:14,080
and is an expert on the
Chinese space economy.
1877
01:17:14,160 --> 01:17:16,600
- There was an interesting
poll a couple of years ago.
1878
01:17:16,680 --> 01:17:19,320
They basically asked the
young population in the UK,
1879
01:17:19,360 --> 01:17:21,040
in the US, and in China,
1880
01:17:21,120 --> 01:17:22,640
what would you like to do when you grow up?
1881
01:17:22,680 --> 01:17:26,040
And the answer in China
was being a taikonaut
1882
01:17:26,080 --> 01:17:26,880
be an astronaut.
1883
01:17:26,920 --> 01:17:27,920
- China take three.
1884
01:17:27,960 --> 01:17:29,400
Meanwhile, the kids in the West
1885
01:17:29,440 --> 01:17:31,760
dream of becoming influencers on Instagram
1886
01:17:31,800 --> 01:17:33,520
or professional TikTokers.
1887
01:17:33,600 --> 01:17:35,840
Perhaps it's no wonder that
China's the clear number two
1888
01:17:35,880 --> 01:17:37,280
in the modern space race.
1889
01:17:37,320 --> 01:17:39,720
- The Guo Wang Constellation
announced last year,
1890
01:17:39,760 --> 01:17:42,320
we're talking about
almost 13,000 satellites,
1891
01:17:42,360 --> 01:17:45,320
and that's comparable
to the super constellations
1892
01:17:45,360 --> 01:17:46,400
that we have in the US,
1893
01:17:46,440 --> 01:17:49,160
which, you know, Starlink, OneWeb, Kuiper.
1894
01:17:49,200 --> 01:17:51,640
It's the similar order of magnitude.
1895
01:17:51,680 --> 01:17:52,880
- But here's the twist,
1896
01:17:52,920 --> 01:17:55,120
the private space entrepreneurs
in Communist China
1897
01:17:55,160 --> 01:17:58,040
are jealous of their capitalist
counterparts in America
1898
01:17:58,080 --> 01:18:01,120
because they are not getting
those juicy government grants.
1899
01:18:01,200 --> 01:18:03,680
- You don't see any of
those subsystems, at least,
1900
01:18:03,720 --> 01:18:07,160
for the time being, being
subcontracted, being outsourced
1901
01:18:07,200 --> 01:18:10,320
to these private companies,
these commercial companies.
1902
01:18:10,360 --> 01:18:12,720
So that is one big difference,
1903
01:18:12,760 --> 01:18:13,600
and that is a significant difference
1904
01:18:13,680 --> 01:18:16,280
that enabled SpaceX to survive and to grow
1905
01:18:16,320 --> 01:18:19,360
in the late 2000s.
1906
01:18:19,440 --> 01:18:20,440
- So it's time to ask
1907
01:18:20,520 --> 01:18:22,480
just how much of the space renaissance
1908
01:18:22,520 --> 01:18:24,600
is really the achievement
of free enterprise
1909
01:18:24,640 --> 01:18:27,520
if most of the revenue
still comes from Uncle Sam.
1910
01:18:27,600 --> 01:18:28,840
Maybe commercial space
1911
01:18:28,880 --> 01:18:31,440
doesn't necessarily mean private demand.
1912
01:18:31,480 --> 01:18:33,960
- When Elon Musk first sent
cargo to the Space Station,
1913
01:18:34,000 --> 01:18:35,440
there were headlines.
1914
01:18:35,520 --> 01:18:38,400
New air private industry
is gonna lead the way.
1915
01:18:38,440 --> 01:18:40,720
(crowd cheering)
1916
01:18:40,800 --> 01:18:41,640
No, they're not.
1917
01:18:42,600 --> 01:18:43,800
Taking cargo to the space station,
1918
01:18:43,840 --> 01:18:45,880
NASA has been doing that for 20 years.
1919
01:18:45,960 --> 01:18:48,400
- So it's not a dirty
secret that governments
1920
01:18:48,440 --> 01:18:51,200
are the primary revenue source.
1921
01:18:51,240 --> 01:18:53,440
The whole reason this new
space industry is coming up
1922
01:18:53,480 --> 01:18:55,840
is 'cause the government
wants the private sector to do it
1923
01:18:55,920 --> 01:18:57,960
'cause the private sector can do it faster.
1924
01:18:58,000 --> 01:19:00,640
The private sector can
iterate and experiment
1925
01:19:00,680 --> 01:19:02,760
and find these other markets.
1926
01:19:02,800 --> 01:19:04,240
- It's an interesting, fun future,
1927
01:19:04,320 --> 01:19:06,360
a little bit of a Wild West right now.
1928
01:19:06,400 --> 01:19:08,000
- [Torsten] The Wild West always reminds me
1929
01:19:08,040 --> 01:19:10,800
of the historic gold rushes
in California, Australia,
1930
01:19:10,840 --> 01:19:13,800
or soon, in asteroid near you.
1931
01:19:13,840 --> 01:19:17,600
The upside of fresh
capital is new jobs globally.
1932
01:19:17,640 --> 01:19:20,800
- We have 40 startups in
our accelerator program.
1933
01:19:20,880 --> 01:19:23,760
More than half of them
come from other countries.
1934
01:19:23,800 --> 01:19:26,720
There are close to 2,000
jobs created in Singapore.
1935
01:19:26,760 --> 01:19:28,160
They're high value adding jobs
1936
01:19:28,200 --> 01:19:30,600
in a very, very niche and competitive,
1937
01:19:30,640 --> 01:19:32,600
but very exciting industry.
1938
01:19:32,640 --> 01:19:35,440
- So we're at the front
end of a very steep slope.
1939
01:19:35,520 --> 01:19:38,080
I mentioned earlier,
700 employees at Firefly.
1940
01:19:38,160 --> 01:19:41,360
Well, we've estimated
that in the next 10 years,
1941
01:19:41,400 --> 01:19:44,640
we're gonna need 10 times
as many employees in space
1942
01:19:44,680 --> 01:19:46,960
than currently work there today.
1943
01:19:47,000 --> 01:19:50,240
In this industry, not
even the sky is the limit.
1944
01:19:50,280 --> 01:19:53,400
- 16 and a half billion pounds of income,
1945
01:19:53,440 --> 01:19:56,080
47,000 jobs.
1946
01:19:56,120 --> 01:19:59,640
So it's phenomenally highly skilled jobs.
1947
01:19:59,680 --> 01:20:00,520
But here's the thing,
1948
01:20:00,560 --> 01:20:03,080
I think sometimes people
think space and think,
1949
01:20:03,120 --> 01:20:05,120
"Oh, that's only for the astronauts."
1950
01:20:05,160 --> 01:20:06,840
"That's only for the astrophysicist."
1951
01:20:06,880 --> 01:20:09,160
We could not be further from the truth.
1952
01:20:09,240 --> 01:20:11,080
We need the designers, the artists,
1953
01:20:11,120 --> 01:20:14,080
the human resources
professional, the engineers.
1954
01:20:14,120 --> 01:20:15,960
- A filmmaker, whether it's a diplomat,
1955
01:20:16,000 --> 01:20:17,920
whether it's an engineer,
1956
01:20:18,000 --> 01:20:19,160
whether it's a space station manager
1957
01:20:19,200 --> 01:20:20,680
or an artist or a botanist.
1958
01:20:20,760 --> 01:20:22,920
- We've got designers,
we've got architects,
1959
01:20:22,960 --> 01:20:25,000
we've got even mechanics
1960
01:20:25,040 --> 01:20:27,920
who want to build fuel stations in space.
1961
01:20:27,960 --> 01:20:30,400
We've got bankers interested.
1962
01:20:30,440 --> 01:20:34,520
We've got fashion designers interested.
1963
01:20:34,560 --> 01:20:36,640
- One of the reasons that I chose
1964
01:20:36,680 --> 01:20:40,160
this area to focus on and to fund
1965
01:20:40,200 --> 01:20:43,960
is the idea that space
from the beginning of time
1966
01:20:44,000 --> 01:20:46,440
has been our source of inspiration.
1967
01:20:46,480 --> 01:20:49,200
You know, we've looked to the heavens.
1968
01:20:49,240 --> 01:20:51,200
Working together, you know,
1969
01:20:51,240 --> 01:20:56,240
space can help us find that
ground of connectedness
1970
01:20:56,640 --> 01:21:01,520
that we all have, and hopefully
bring out our better angels.
1971
01:21:01,560 --> 01:21:04,160
(gentle music)
1972
01:21:06,400 --> 01:21:08,120
- Dinosaurs found out the hard way
1973
01:21:08,160 --> 01:21:10,800
that if you don't have a space
program, you may go extinct.
1974
01:21:10,840 --> 01:21:13,120
I'm meeting the guy
who's building life ship,
1975
01:21:13,200 --> 01:21:16,320
a company that wants to
preserve humanity's DNA.
1976
01:21:17,520 --> 01:21:20,680
It's fitting that we are here
in the ocean where life began.
1977
01:21:20,720 --> 01:21:23,800
- Yeah, where life began,
and then came out onto land.
1978
01:21:23,840 --> 01:21:25,840
Gaia and Earth wants to reproduce.
1979
01:21:25,880 --> 01:21:28,160
And so with LifeShip, what we're doing
1980
01:21:28,200 --> 01:21:32,520
is we're assembling the genetic
code of Earth and humanity
1981
01:21:32,560 --> 01:21:35,800
to send to space and to send to stars.
1982
01:21:35,880 --> 01:21:40,000
So we created a consumer product.
1983
01:21:40,080 --> 01:21:41,800
Customer registers online
1984
01:21:41,840 --> 01:21:44,240
and they build out their
profile of who they are.
1985
01:21:44,280 --> 01:21:47,320
For people to send their DNA to space,
1986
01:21:47,360 --> 01:21:51,640
kind of like a digital
twin backup of yourself.
1987
01:21:51,680 --> 01:21:53,960
There's a guide with a
number of facts on the mission
1988
01:21:54,000 --> 01:21:55,960
and how it gets to the moon.
1989
01:21:56,040 --> 01:22:00,280
A boarding pass to the moon.
1990
01:22:00,320 --> 01:22:03,520
And then there's a saliva
swab that you do a sample
1991
01:22:03,560 --> 01:22:05,880
and then put it back in this envelope
1992
01:22:05,920 --> 01:22:08,880
and mail it back for the LifeShip mission.
1993
01:22:08,920 --> 01:22:10,720
- [Torsten] The DNA isn't sequenced.
1994
01:22:10,760 --> 01:22:12,920
It's extracted and encased in polymer,
1995
01:22:12,960 --> 01:22:16,160
then sealed in a capsule
that protects it from radiation.
1996
01:22:17,080 --> 01:22:20,680
- It's someone like a
Noah's Ark to the stars.
1997
01:22:20,720 --> 01:22:23,680
This is a record of Earth today
1998
01:22:23,720 --> 01:22:27,360
that future generations could get
1999
01:22:27,400 --> 01:22:30,840
and bring back species
that are no longer here.
2000
01:22:31,680 --> 01:22:34,880
- Yeah, in a way, your company and the kit
2001
01:22:34,920 --> 01:22:38,560
is sort of like the smallest,
cheapest consumer product,
2002
01:22:38,600 --> 01:22:40,920
the most easy to grasp idea
2003
01:22:40,960 --> 01:22:42,320
that I've seen in my whole journey.
2004
01:22:42,360 --> 01:22:43,840
Very, very cool story.
2005
01:22:43,880 --> 01:22:45,920
Together with many other precious species,
2006
01:22:45,960 --> 01:22:48,920
Sheldon's genetic code
is aboard Ben's LifeShip,
2007
01:22:48,960 --> 01:22:51,240
which is mounted on a Firefly Moon Lander,
2008
01:22:51,280 --> 01:22:53,960
which is powered by
Rocket Lab made solar panels
2009
01:22:54,000 --> 01:22:57,280
and launched on a SpaceX
rocket on a private mission
2010
01:22:57,320 --> 01:23:00,840
primarily financed by a new
commercial NASA program,
2011
01:23:00,880 --> 01:23:03,200
bringing us back full circle.
2012
01:23:03,240 --> 01:23:07,360
Millions love space and
follow every rocket launch life.
2013
01:23:07,440 --> 01:23:09,040
I ask you, which other industry
2014
01:23:09,080 --> 01:23:11,640
captures our collective
imagination like that?
2015
01:23:14,040 --> 01:23:16,600
Space has always had
a different kind of ROI,
2016
01:23:16,680 --> 01:23:18,480
return on inspiration.
2017
01:23:23,640 --> 01:23:25,480
- It's hard to understand today
2018
01:23:25,520 --> 01:23:29,720
a sort of multi-year slow motion race
2019
01:23:29,760 --> 01:23:32,320
that captivated the entire planet.
2020
01:23:32,400 --> 01:23:35,320
And first, we were losing and
we were behind the Soviets.
2021
01:23:35,400 --> 01:23:37,120
Then we were winning.
2022
01:23:37,200 --> 01:23:38,760
The imagery was beautiful,
2023
01:23:38,800 --> 01:23:41,680
seeing people floating
in space for the first time.
2024
01:23:41,760 --> 01:23:44,920
So it's easy to be
captivated as a young kid.
2025
01:23:47,120 --> 01:23:49,360
I was three or four years old, literally.
2026
01:23:49,440 --> 01:23:54,280
And I was fascinated by
the "Star Trek" ecosystem.
2027
01:23:54,320 --> 01:23:57,320
- I think the first time that
I really like got into space
2028
01:23:57,400 --> 01:24:01,120
was when I was a kid, I
like read a lot of space books.
2029
01:24:01,200 --> 01:24:03,040
- You know, I was born
in Trinidad and Tobago.
2030
01:24:03,120 --> 01:24:04,640
And as a little girl,
2031
01:24:04,680 --> 01:24:08,840
I was really excited and
really good at math and science.
2032
01:24:08,880 --> 01:24:12,120
- My parents took me to
Kennedy Space Center in Florida
2033
01:24:14,080 --> 01:24:16,000
and I saw that gigantic building.
2034
01:24:16,040 --> 01:24:18,200
And my dad said, "That's
where they make rockets."
2035
01:24:18,240 --> 01:24:21,560
And it was as if my mind,
my heart, and my soul
2036
01:24:21,600 --> 01:24:23,240
exploded at the same time.
2037
01:24:24,360 --> 01:24:26,880
And you don't forget
moments like that in your life.
2038
01:24:28,000 --> 01:24:29,840
- Ever since I was very young,
2039
01:24:29,880 --> 01:24:31,720
maybe, you know, nine or 10,
2040
01:24:31,800 --> 01:24:35,440
I was actually lying in the
back of my dad's pickup truck
2041
01:24:35,480 --> 01:24:38,480
in rural Georgia looking up at the stars.
2042
01:24:38,520 --> 01:24:41,760
- And to see a young child in
the next generation growing up
2043
01:24:41,800 --> 01:24:43,960
knowing that not even the sky is a limit,
2044
01:24:44,040 --> 01:24:46,120
what a gift to be able to provide to her.
2045
01:24:46,160 --> 01:24:47,440
- When I was a kid,
2046
01:24:47,520 --> 01:24:49,480
I was dreaming of becoming multi-planetary.
2047
01:24:49,520 --> 01:24:51,640
So making drawings of domes
2048
01:24:51,680 --> 01:24:54,000
and structures on all the planet
2049
01:24:54,040 --> 01:24:55,600
full of plants and flowers.
2050
01:24:56,880 --> 01:24:59,560
- For me, I have always
had really big dreams.
2051
01:24:59,640 --> 01:25:01,640
And as a child, it's easy to say,
2052
01:25:01,680 --> 01:25:02,600
"I wanna go to space,"
2053
01:25:02,640 --> 01:25:03,680
"I wanna be president,"
2054
01:25:03,720 --> 01:25:06,240
"I wanna be a CEO."
2055
01:25:06,280 --> 01:25:08,960
- [Torsten] And her journey
started at McDonald's.
2056
01:25:09,000 --> 01:25:11,280
See, what I learned making this documentary
2057
01:25:11,320 --> 01:25:14,680
is that it's not the billionaires
against the rest of us.
2058
01:25:14,720 --> 01:25:16,760
- Thanks to Humanity, we're here.
2059
01:25:16,800 --> 01:25:19,600
- It's not about public
versus private initiatives.
2060
01:25:19,680 --> 01:25:21,240
This is all about those
2061
01:25:21,280 --> 01:25:24,120
who are effectively
accelerating us into the future.
2062
01:25:25,560 --> 01:25:28,040
Our story always has
and always will be written
2063
01:25:28,080 --> 01:25:31,800
by those who imagine any
new space as a blank canvas.
2064
01:25:31,840 --> 01:25:34,240
However, their lofty dreams
2065
01:25:34,280 --> 01:25:36,640
still need to be tethered
to the hard realities
2066
01:25:36,720 --> 01:25:39,160
on the ground below, like cash.
2067
01:25:39,200 --> 01:25:42,320
Space businesses are
still, well, businesses.
2068
01:25:42,360 --> 01:25:44,520
So many startups will crash and burn,
2069
01:25:44,560 --> 01:25:47,120
but some will be making a galactic profit.
2070
01:25:48,600 --> 01:25:49,960
- Pass that off to private enterprise
2071
01:25:50,000 --> 01:25:51,400
'cause they'll figure
out how to do it cheaper
2072
01:25:51,480 --> 01:25:53,080
'cause that's kind of what they do.
2073
01:25:53,120 --> 01:25:54,360
That's...
2074
01:25:54,400 --> 01:25:55,680
That's why they exist.
2075
01:25:55,720 --> 01:25:57,160
To make a buck.
2076
01:25:57,240 --> 01:26:00,680
- Now I'm returning to
42 HQ, having seem early,
2077
01:26:00,720 --> 01:26:03,880
but thriving markets and
real customer traction.
2078
01:26:05,840 --> 01:26:07,680
And this is the end.
2079
01:26:07,720 --> 01:26:09,280
Take four.
2080
01:26:09,360 --> 01:26:11,040
So let's just imagine for a sec
2081
01:26:11,080 --> 01:26:13,680
our next giant leap of this rock.
2082
01:26:13,720 --> 01:26:16,400
Perhaps then, humans way in the future,
2083
01:26:16,440 --> 01:26:18,520
those spacefaring homosapiens,
2084
01:26:18,560 --> 01:26:21,240
who for sure will be
force of gravity defying,
2085
01:26:22,320 --> 01:26:23,760
and Elon edifying,
2086
01:26:24,640 --> 01:26:27,280
habitat's finding and
shiny asteroids mining.
2087
01:26:27,320 --> 01:26:30,160
These supreme beings
of all shapes and sizings
2088
01:26:30,200 --> 01:26:33,320
may be even blindened with
a trillion dollar spaceships
2089
01:26:33,360 --> 01:26:36,040
and their microgravity bread protein dips.
2090
01:26:36,120 --> 01:26:39,960
Yes, those future
homosapiens, ha, homospaciens,
2091
01:26:40,000 --> 01:26:42,960
will look back at us
ancestors and be thanking us.
2092
01:26:43,000 --> 01:26:44,840
Not just the four or five famous dudes.
2093
01:26:44,880 --> 01:26:45,920
No.
2094
01:26:45,960 --> 01:26:46,760
The rest of us,
2095
01:26:46,800 --> 01:26:49,120
the best of us who
possess the mental fortitude
2096
01:26:49,200 --> 01:26:51,640
from our high school kids science fairs
2097
01:26:51,680 --> 01:26:55,600
to boomers boosted into
cislunar nursing cares.
2098
01:26:55,680 --> 01:26:58,040
Our climate defenders and metal benders,
2099
01:26:58,080 --> 01:27:01,040
the bureaucrats, plutocrats,
diplomats, copycats,
2100
01:27:01,080 --> 01:27:03,080
the engineers and marketeers,
2101
01:27:03,120 --> 01:27:05,240
the musketeers and pioneers,
2102
01:27:05,280 --> 01:27:07,520
the privateers and financiers.
2103
01:27:07,560 --> 01:27:10,160
We are not mere passengers
here on spaceship Earth.
2104
01:27:10,200 --> 01:27:13,480
For what it's worth, me
and you, we're all crew
2105
01:27:13,520 --> 01:27:15,880
because the science girls and rocket fellas
2106
01:27:15,960 --> 01:27:19,160
have no time to kill to
see their dreams fulfilled.
2107
01:27:21,720 --> 01:27:23,360
Today is day one,
2108
01:27:24,320 --> 01:27:26,080
and it's time to build.
2109
01:27:27,520 --> 01:27:30,680
(inspirational music)
2110
01:27:38,160 --> 01:27:40,760
(upbeat music)
2111
01:28:02,000 --> 01:28:05,400
(upbeat music continues)
2112
01:28:26,440 --> 01:28:29,800
(upbeat music continues)
165767
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