There is simply no other company that can compete with SpaceX’s cost and responsiveness.
If a company dominates a sector simply because it is better than the alternative companies is that a bad thing? It doesn’t seem like they are blocking other companies from entering the field.
SpaceX’s Starshield has the potential to remove many of these barriers to “app” development. For companies that pay for Starshield, SpaceX will provide satellite command and control, constellation maintenance, cybersecurity, encrypted processing of data, and integration and launch services. Most importantly, SpaceX will provide a modular bus with all the payload requirements and a plug-and-play operating system.
That seems like a valuable product.
Their manufacturing capacity, combined with the lowest kilogram-to-orbit launch costs in the industry and unmatched launch cadence
This is good for space travel overall as it will lower costs, making it easier to launch more experimental components, human spaceflight etc.
This market opportunity will drive more excitement, innovation, and investment into the Starshield program, creating more market opportunities
Okay…
Honestly, these all seem like good things, one can hardly blame SpaceX for the lack of success of their competitors. The whole article really feels like “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.”
I agree, had very similar reactions reading the article. I do think it’s important to keep an eye on a company becoming very dominant in a market though, to ensure that anti-competitive practices don’t come out if a threat ever does arise.
I think they really just wanted to make the point that they found the Ukraine cut off issue concerning, and then built a whole article out from there. Which is fair, but that whole issue is weird and novel.
