Montreal Space Symposium 2019

As if developing a rocket to fly to orbit weren’t hard enough, for-profit entities attempting to make a business from launch-as-a-service face incredible challenges that are tangentially related to the engineering or, often, not at all. This piece will dive into the developmental and operational challenges faced by commercial launch organizations globally, and those specific to Canadian organizations. The global challenges of launch vehicle development and operation will be covered first. This includes the challenges associated with regulatory compliance, with launch vehicle safety, and with defining a competitive business model in the overcrowded small-launch market. The challenges specific to Canadian launch businesses will be covered following that. These challenges include a lack of resources, a lack of experience, lack of launch sites, lack of regulatory oversight, and myopic venture capital funding. The talk concludes by looking at potential ways forward and the political and economic ramifications of launch from Canada.