Here is a talk I gave at the Mars Society Conference on the subject of why SpaceX is so innovative.
8 replies on “SpaceX Talk I gave”
Very interesting perspective to put SpaceX’s pursuits in. Makes sense that a more “Agile”, iterative & exploratory, tight-OODA-loop process coupled with hosting engineering and fabrication under one roof would help them achieve what the old-school NASA process takes too long to do or isn’t able to accomplish. (We can all lament the failure of communication that produced the loss of Challenger and her crew. People on the factory floor knew the loss of resiliency of the booster O-rings at low temperatures was a problem, but nobody in the org chart was able to act on that knowledge.)
Per my TSL 217 question, I’m very interested in the set of things we need to be working on to bring off-Earth settlement (and attempts at opening other new frontiers) within reach. I see you have other talks on that topic that I’m looking forward to checking out. SpaceX’s advances have been truly exciting to me, and the propulsion-and-transit problem that Bill’s answer (@ 30:35) focused on is certainly a key part of the problem space, but there are lots of other considerations for making this work that I suspect we underestimate (but am confident we can solve if we put our minds to it). This is stuff I would definitely like to get more involved in working on and solving.
Glad to see your work here and looking forward to your future posts!
The Mars Society is currently judging a competition for a 1000 person settlement on Mars. My submission is at the link below. Basically, technology is half the battle – I’ve spent over a decade working out ways to solve that. The other half is economics, but I think I have a good model there as well. Here’s the link. https://macroinvent.com/mars-1000/
Great presentation Kent!
Very good talk, Kent! You nailed it. Lack of agile methods (and very clumsy attempts to try it using their own notions) is why I retired early from Boeing. I could not stand watching projects that should have taken a few weeks instead take months or years.
Where was this conference held?
Thanks!
This was in Pasadena last year. We hold them in different cities around the US each Fall, but next year’s will also be in California (University of Southern California, Oct 17-20, 2019). International chapters also hold conferences.
Really looking forward to watching this when I have a chance!
A very clear and thought-provoking presentation. Thanks for sharing it here!
8 replies on “SpaceX Talk I gave”
Very interesting perspective to put SpaceX’s pursuits in. Makes sense that a more “Agile”, iterative & exploratory, tight-OODA-loop process coupled with hosting engineering and fabrication under one roof would help them achieve what the old-school NASA process takes too long to do or isn’t able to accomplish. (We can all lament the failure of communication that produced the loss of Challenger and her crew. People on the factory floor knew the loss of resiliency of the booster O-rings at low temperatures was a problem, but nobody in the org chart was able to act on that knowledge.)
Per my TSL 217 question, I’m very interested in the set of things we need to be working on to bring off-Earth settlement (and attempts at opening other new frontiers) within reach. I see you have other talks on that topic that I’m looking forward to checking out. SpaceX’s advances have been truly exciting to me, and the propulsion-and-transit problem that Bill’s answer (@ 30:35) focused on is certainly a key part of the problem space, but there are lots of other considerations for making this work that I suspect we underestimate (but am confident we can solve if we put our minds to it). This is stuff I would definitely like to get more involved in working on and solving.
Glad to see your work here and looking forward to your future posts!
The Mars Society is currently judging a competition for a 1000 person settlement on Mars. My submission is at the link below. Basically, technology is half the battle – I’ve spent over a decade working out ways to solve that. The other half is economics, but I think I have a good model there as well. Here’s the link.
https://macroinvent.com/mars-1000/
Great presentation Kent!
Very good talk, Kent! You nailed it. Lack of agile methods (and very clumsy attempts to try it using their own notions) is why I retired early from Boeing. I could not stand watching projects that should have taken a few weeks instead take months or years.
Where was this conference held?
Thanks!
This was in Pasadena last year. We hold them in different cities around the US each Fall, but next year’s will also be in California (University of Southern California, Oct 17-20, 2019). International chapters also hold conferences.
Really looking forward to watching this when I have a chance!
A very clear and thought-provoking presentation. Thanks for sharing it here!
Thanks!