SpaceX's first customer ready to go like a rocket

01 September 2016 - 09:58 By Reuters

Elon Musk's SpaceX has signed its first customer to use a previously flown rocket, with the launch planned for later this year, the company said this week. The launch for Luxembourg-based satellite operator SES SA SESFg.LU will mark the first commercial reuse of a Falcon 9 rocket, which is crucial to efforts by technology entrepreneur Musk's Space Exploration Technologies to reduce the cost of space launches.Terms of the deal were not disclosed. SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell earlier said the company was targeting a 30% discount for launches aboard previously flown rockets, which would bring the price down to about $43-million per flight, a fraction of what competitors charge.SpaceX has so far landed six Falcon 9 rockets and will attempt to land its seventh after Saturday's scheduled launch in Florida of an Israeli communications satellite."We believe reusable rockets will open up a new era of space flight and make access to space more efficient in terms of cost and manifest management," Martin Halliwell, SES chief technology officer, said.SES, which in 2013 became SpaceX's first commercial customer, plans to launch its SES-10 communications satellite on a used Falcon 9 rocket later this year.The rocket previously flew in April to send a cargo ship on its way to the International Space Station for Nasa, said SpaceX spokesman John Taylor."Relaunching a rocket that has already delivered spacecraft to orbit is an important milestone on the path to complete and rapid reusability," Shotwell said.Musk founded SpaceX in 2002. His aim was to slash launch costs to make travel to Mars affordable. The company plans to fly its first unmanned spacecraft to Mars in 2018 and send humans to Mars as early as 2024. ..

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