What's this just seen in the night sky above Seattle?
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More from @trengriffin

26 Mar
"SpaceX had 25 orbital launches in 2020. All but five of these missions utilized flight proven boosters, and 14 payload fairing halves were re-flown. SpaceX aims to almost double that launch cadence in 2021."

How many of the 25 were Starlink launches?
nasaspaceflight.com/2021/03/spacex…
"More than half of the 2020 missions — 14 of them, to be precise — launched in support of SpaceX's Starlink satellite-internet project." google.com/amp/s/www.spac…
"Musk eventually plans to build 1,000 Starship rockets and launch three of them a day to send 1 million people to Mars. The 387-foot-long Starship rocket is meant to be fully and rapidly reusable." google.com/amp/s/www.busi…
Read 4 tweets
20 Mar
1/ In early 2000 Paul Allen asked Craig McCaw if he wanted to assume control of Metricom's wireless Ricochet service. Paul wanted to make the service a success and was willing to pay Craig to assume control (the price would be negative). Craig and I met with Paul in his office.
2/ Paul Allen's office was straight up out of a James Bond Movie. For example, a glass exterior wall with shades that dropped down to darken the room when a button on his desk was pushed.

We reviewed the pitch deck, talked about it and were given the financials and other data.
3/ Even with a negative purchase price we concluded the business couldn't be saved. A combination of physics and nonstandard hardware/software created unsolvable problems. The service worked technically in certain locations but it would never scale to create shareholder value.
Read 9 tweets
20 Mar
1/ Broadband Internet provided via a non-geostationary satellite constellation operating at Ka band is an idea enabled by a startup I co-founded of in 1994. Without a team of about 20 people obtaining an ITU allocation in 1995, Starlink, OneWeb and Kuiper wouldn't exist.
2/ My version of the story of Teledesic is told in this link. 25iq.com/2016/07/23/a-d…
With any wireless communication network there is: 1) can the system provide high quality service technically; and 2) can the service generate enough free cash flow reward investors?
3/ Wait! Is Tren saying that without a team of 20 people Starlink, OneWeb and Kuiper would not exist? Is he saying there would only be geostationary satellite broadband internet services without Teledesic obtaining the "NGSO FSS" allocation at the ITU in 1995? Yes.
Read 5 tweets
20 Mar
This below is not iterative product development. $18 billion of non-recurring engineering (NRE) incurred and zero launches so far. Each launch costs $2 billion.

The book Liftoff explains why: "To adopt iterative development you have to let people see you fail." (page 25)
"In iterative software development, engineers make rapid changes, ask for user feedback and adjust the software for the next increment. Most defense programs use traditional “waterfall” development." spacenews.com/pentagon-advis…
'Being brave about potential failure in public is how you learn. Making mistakes is how you learn. Being out there.

Most people are like, 'What if people criticize me?' Going to happen. Be brave, be audacious." osam.com/pdfs/Tren_Grif…
Read 4 tweets
19 Mar
I plan to read "Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days That Launched SpaceX" this weekend. I may tweet a few comments as my journey through the book unfolds. People *love* rockets with a passion that is uncommon, especially billionaires. amazon.com/Liftoff-Desper…
2/ Quiz: Why was cost not dropping?

"Companies in the US and Russia still used the same decades-old technology to launch rockets into space, and the price kept going up. It seemed like things were going in the wrong direction, so Musk founded SpaceX." spacenews.com/book-excerpt-l…
3/ That question is the business equivalent of the type of question Elon Musk asks potential engineering employees:

"You’re standing on the surface of the Earth. You walk one mile south, one mile west and one mile north. You end up exactly where you started. Where are you?”
Read 21 tweets
13 Mar
1/ "In a networked world, mayhem in one market spreads instantaneously to all others..."

Mandelbrot wrote this previous sentence in 2004. amazon.com/dp/0465043577/

The world is vastly more "networked" today and will continue to get more networked.
2/ With each ratchet up in the networking of the world, this phenomenon is magnified:

"people almost never make decisions independently." nytimes.com/2007/04/15/mag…

The world is more complex than ever.

Some people are bewildered when something like a five sigma event happens.
3/ Every increase in the ability of signals from one source to reach others who can resignal creates more feedback loops that are ever more powerful.

The bumper sticker that said “Shit happens” should now say:

“Shit happens faster and at far greater often nonlinear scale."
Read 9 tweets

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