Space Elevator Company LiftPort In Trouble

TropicalCoder writes "The LiftPort Group, founded four years ago with the lofty dream of building a stairway to heaven, has seemingly reached the end the line. The dream was to develop a ribbon of carbon nanotubes 100,000 km long, anchored to the Earth's surface and with a counterweight in space, providing a permanent bridge to orbit. Elevator cars would be robotic 'lifters' which would climb the ribbon to deliver cargo and eventually people to orbit or beyond. Now LiftPort has all but run out of funds, and the State of Washington's Securities Division has entered a Statement of Charges (PDF) against LiftPort Inc. dba LiftPort Group and founder Michael Laine."

Comments

What Liftport is being charged with:

[Icarus1919]

What Liftport is being charged with, from the pdf:

1. The offer and/or sale of the investments described above constitute the offer and/or sale of a security as defined in RCW 21.20.005 (10) and (12).
2. Michael Laine violated RCW 21.20.040, by offering and selling said securities while not registered as a securities salesperson or broker-dealer in the State of Washington.
3. Liftport, Inc. violated 21.20.140 by offering and selling unregistered securities.
4. In connection with the offer or sale of the said securities Liftport, Inc., violated RCW 21.20.010 because, as set forth in the Tentative Findings of Fact, Respondent made misstatements of material fact or omitted to state material facts necessary in order to make the statements made, in light of circumstances under which they were made, not misleading and/or engaged in acts and practices that operated as a fraud or deceit.

Re:What Liftport is being charged with:

[ReidMaynard]

also this from page 3:

9. Liftport failed to provide material information regarding the company including, but not limited to: financial statements; use of proceeds; projected costs to develop and build the space elevator; general risk factors related to the space technology; and specific risk factors related to space elevator production. I think even a 5th grader would consider the first space elevator a risky investment.

Not gonna happen

[Reality Master 101]

I was pretty much convinced the space elevator was never going to happen with our current understanding of material technology anyway. There was a study in Nature a while back by Nicola Pugno who pointed out that defects in carbon nanoribbon would pretty much make it impossible. You need 62 gigapascals of tension strength for a space elevator. Carbon nanoribbon gives you 100 gigapascals. First, note how slim that margin is, and that's with PERFECT nanoribbon. But perfection is difficult to achieve in the real world, and inevitable atomic defects reduce the strength of the ribbon dramatically. Just a single atom defect in a single strand reduces strength by 30%. Bulk material consisting of many strands reduces that even further.

I can't find the original article, but here's a typical write-up at the time.

Who knows, maybe somebody will invent something better than carbon nanotubes, but even a perfect ribbon has a mighty slim margin.

Re:Not gonna happen

[KonoWatakushi]

Where did you pull that 100GPa number from? From what I have read, the theoretical strength is closer to 300GPa.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/287 /5453/637

Yes, it will be difficult to produce cables of sufficient quality, but I find it surprising how many people are willing to make such unfounded claims of impossibility. It may not happen in the near future, but if the theoretical strength is even remotely close to reality, the space elevator is basically a certainty.

Re:Wow!!

[vulgrin]

They weren't going to just build a space elevator, much of the technology that they were developing was also going to be licensed off. They weren't just about the end-game. Like many companies with long term goals, they fund their R&D by licensing their past R&D.

Re:Blue Sky Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

you are wrong in your application of blue sky laws (other posters are right, sorry)

however you nailed it with this part:
"seems to stem from his lack of registering with the State that he would be selling securities."

that is exactly what happened. i gave the documents to the individuals, but not to the state. i thought i was covered under Reg D, as i was only asking for $500k and that i could work with unaccredited investors. so far as i know, and i think the state agrees, that part is true. what i didnt know, was that i had to file with the states, too. under Reg. D, you dont need to file with the feds. since it was a federal exemption, i thought i also excepted me from the individual states as well. i found out - much to my embarrassment, anger and frustration, that i was wrong. it came down to not filing in the state... for which i have to pay a penalty.

but lets keep it in perspective here - its 'only' a $2ok fine. if i had done something really 'bad', that would have been much much much stiffer.

and no, so far as i know, i dont have any angry investors - anywhere. it is a paperwork snafu, and nothing more.

thanks for actually taking the time to read and understand the documents. most people on slashdot are not bothering to do that.

take care. mjl
michael laine
liftport group.