Mars, no really; again

[Montmorency]

The point is that the subsidies do not appear to have been a factor that made the rockets possible.

I'm emphasizing the indirect subsidies to SpaceX through direct subsidies to Tesla.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk

Elon Musk made his early career from selling startups and stock. Before the last few years, SpaceX was mostly about building confidence and valuation to secure long-term contracts.

As of May 2012, SpaceX had operated on total funding of approximately $1 billion in its first ten years of operation. Of this, private equity provided about $200M, with Musk investing approximately $100M and other investors having put in about $100M (Founders Fund, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, …).[88] The remainder has come from progress payments on long-term launch contracts and development contracts. As of April 2012, NASA had put in about $400–500M of this amount, with most of that as progress payments on launch contracts.[83] By May 2012, SpaceX had contracts for 40 launch missions, and each of those contracts provide down payments at contract signing, plus many are paying progress payments as launch vehicle components are built in advance of mission launch, driven in part by US accounting rules for recognizing long-term revenue.[83]

With the new millenium, Musk had however many millions to invest from his previous success; most conservatively he could have put everything in financial instruments and settled down. Tesla and SpaceX were both launched around the same time, in 2002-3, with Musk a cofounder of Tesla.

The company enjoys various forms of federal and state subsidy, which it was estimated in 2015 amounted to at least $30,000 for each vehicle sold, or cumulatively $4.9 billion

The Tesla products were (still are?) sold at a loss, and that was only sustainable with subsidies. When Musk assumed full control in 2008, Tesla was nearing bankruptcy. The Obama admin and the states (more troubling since state subsidy is basically just a euphemism for corruption) swept in to save the day.

By January 2009, Tesla had raised US$187 million and delivered 147 cars. Musk himself had invested US$70 million.[48][51] In May 2009, Daimler AG acquired an equity stake of less than 10% of Tesla for a reported US$50 million,[52][53] again saving Tesla.[54] Toyota provided a similar amount in 2010.[53]

In June 2009, Tesla was approved to receive US$465 million in low-interest loans from the 2007 US$8 billion Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program by the United States Department of Energy.[55] The funding came in 2010 and supported engineering and production of the Model S, as well as the development of commercial powertrain technology.[55]
[...]
In May 2013, Tesla raised $1.02 billion ($660m from bonds) partially to repay the DOE loans (early[66]) after their first profitable quarter.[67][68] In February 2014 the company sold $2 billion in bonds (to build GigaFactory 1).[68] In August 2015 Tesla sold $738 million in stock (for the Model X)[69] and in May 2016, $1.46 billion in stock ($1.26 billion for the Model 3).[70] As of January 29, 2016, Musk owned about 28.9 million Tesla shares, or about 22% of the total.[71][72]

Tesla stated that its automotive branch had a gross margin of 23.1% as of 2Q2016, and has generally been above 20%.[73] However, expenditures[74][75] for expanding future production (such as Gigafactory 1[76] and Model 3[77]) are bigger than product profit, resulting in a net loss.[78]

Look at the graph for production and sales. This is what Musk has succeeded at, offering a promise and keeping it afloat long enough to draw widespread attention.

Musk famously draws no salary; his continuing income from his companies is dependent entirely on his stock options and performance bonuses. In other words, the more hype, the more value and investor interest it attracts, which directly contributes to his cash flow. Without the success of Tesla over the past decade, almpst certainly predicated on subsidies, it's arguable that SpaceX would have trouble demonstrating ability to fulfill contract milestones, thus impairing its long-term viability as a productive enterprise. You could always speculate otherwise. Maybe an expert analysis could show Musk could have lifted not one finger after 2001 and generated all necessary capital from financial instruments and investments alone, but I don't know how to do that. Maybe in the event of Tesla's failure he would have been willing to sacrifice more of his own wealth, or take on more debt to finance his passion, but that's still detrimental to corporate viability and damaging to confidence in his ability and leadership. Ultimately, subsidies count as a material contribution to the success of Tesla directly and therefore SpaceX indirectly. None of this is meant to demean Musk or the technology (his philosophy is another subject entirely); the petrochemical/automobile industries have received many orders of magnitude more over the past century.

[Viking]

Ultimately, subsidies count as a material contribution to the success of Tesla directly and therefore SpaceX indirectly.

Tesla subsidies contributing to the success of SpaceX is of course very different from these subsidies being necessary for that success. For the former, I don't have much of an opinion. For the latter, the evidence provided thus far is indirect and incomplete.


Without more information on Musk's finances, we can't really tell where the money he invested 'ultimately' came from; likewise with other investors. Without more details on the early funding history of SpaceX, we can't really tell how important different factors were for the company's success there. Such information may be easily accessible on the web, but I am not inclined to go look for it for the time being..

[HopAlongBunny]

Overlooked has been the failure of Elon to deliver his payload to a proper orbit.
Earth-Mars orbit? Nah, missed that.
Somewhere around the asteroid belt? Closer...
Collision course with the Earth!!! Maybe :

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/mu...arth-1.4537407

[Gregoshi]

My son stumbled upon the video below which focuses on the sound of the Falcon launch. It is meant to be watched with headphones which will give you a surround sound like experience. Pretty cool stuff.