NASA Splits $1.1B For Three Commercial Spacecraft

coondoggie writes "NASA today continued its development of commercial space systems by splitting a little over $1.1 billion with Boeing, Space Exploration Technologies (Space X) and Sierra Nevada to develop and build advanced spaceships. 'Today's awards give a huge advantage to the three companies that got them, because competitors will need to fund their own development in its entirety. On the other hand, by partnering with the competitors, NASA has managed to seed the development of five different manned space vehicles for under $1B so far, a leap forward for the evolving space passenger market. They've paid for it on a reward-for-progress basis, handing out pre-agreed amounts of money for each specified milestone. SpaceX was well ahead of the other two competitors because of the unmanned Dragon, which has already berthed with the International Space Station. The company has borne the brunt of the development costs itself, putting in about $300 million of its own money in addition to about $75 million from NASA.'"

Comments

"Lemme seed you, c'mere!"

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

"It's seeding!"

"It's the well-connected using government to pick economic winners and losers."

Don't laugh. We are not so far from the era where government deciding, "This country isn't big enough to support several, therefore company A may operate and company B is hereby put out of business." was viewed as a legitimate principle. Socialists cheered while money exchanged hands behind the scenes just like it had for thousands of years with kings.

Only the memetic wrapper changed.