Describe key trends of the space industry
The space industry is rapidly expanding, with the size of the global space economy reaching \$469 billion in 2021. By 2030, that figure is expected to inrease to \$600 billion. This growth is fueled by several key trends.
The barrier to entry is lowering
Space has never been more accessible. For example, the cost to deliver a payload to space has decreased significantly over the past few decades. When the Space Shuttle was launched in 1981, it cost \$65,400 per kilogram, around \$1.8 billion per launch. When SpaceX launched Falcon Heavy in 2018, it cost \$1,500 per kilogram, about \$95 million per launch.
As launch costs decrease, the size of satellites is also decreasing. Satellites have been reduced from roughly the size of a school bus to the size of a loaf of bread. The Hubble Telescope, launched in 1990, weighed 11,000 kilograms, but by 2014, Planet Labs' Dove satellites weighed as little as 5 kilograms.
Together, these factors have resulted in an explosion in the number of satellites orbiting the earth. There were 1,713 satellites launched in 2021, a 40% increase over 2020, taking the number of total satellites circling the earth to 4,852 by the end of 2021.
Technology is enabling more compelling use cases
What are the implications of all these satellites orbiting the earth? Many are equipped with sensors that observe the earth, and in turn, these sensors are generating enormous amounts of data.
As the sensors' capabilities advance, the data from space is becoming more granular and useful. The sheer amount of data collected now is staggering. A single National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Earth Science mission can now generate seven times more data than has been collected over the program's lifetime.
The usefulness of this data opens new possibilities across industries, including ecological monitoring and supply-chain health awareness. At the same time, the increase in the amount of data also requires more processing power to handle.
The playing field is leveling
Space used to be reserved for government applications, whether that was exploratory missions or satellite monitoring. But that balance has shifted, with space becoming a place ripe with commercial opportunities.
There are more than 183,000 people employed in the space industry, running the gamut from massive corporations to smaller startups. In 2020 alone, around \$8 billion was spent on space-startup investments.
In the next unit, we'll take a closer look at some of those key players in the industry.