Space

In an update on Tuesday, Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp says the company is working to “identify and correct” the issue that led its New Glenn rocket to explode on the launchpad last month. Limp adds that the company plans to return to flight by the end of this year with a new launch pad configuration.

The ESA’s Euclid telescope captured an enormous image containing some 60 million stars and nebulae. It took 26 hours to amass, starting March 23rd, 2025, and it’s undeniably stunning. You can download the full-res TIFF version, which weighs in at 697MB, or just watch the video below.

SpaceX bonds are creating losses for the fast-money types who piled in at the offering. “Bond types either aren’t sure that SpaceX will hang on to its investment-grade credit ratings, or will only get involved if they get paid a fat risk premium for doing so,” the Financial Times explains. SpaceX stock is, as of this writing, trading below its IPO price. Gee, if only someone had pointed out that this company is a stinker.

President and COO Gwynne Shotwell has apparently told investors that SpaceX plans to launch a new terrestrial Starlink service that would sell mobile contracts directly to individuals in the US — a threat that could extract better revenue-sharing deals from its current telecom partners. Analysts think a T-Mobile acquisition makes sense to accelerate the move and solve SpaceX’s spectrum deficit issue.

Musk’s total net worth is now $957 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That figure is still $660 billion higher than Larry Page, the next person on the list, whose net worth is $297 billion.

The open-source AI startup has a deal through 2029, similar to Anthropic and Google, to rent compute capacity from SpaceX’s Colossus 2 data center for $150 million per month (up to $6.3 billion), reports the Wall Street Journal.

While SpaceX plans satellite-based AI servers, Bloomberg reports it ran into trouble trying to develop and run Grok AI in Memphis, citing unnamed sources. They claim that deals renting capacity to Anthropic ($15 billion annually) and Google ($920 million per month) happened following hardware variation and lag issues:

As reported by CNBC, the New York Times, and others, trading commenced at a price 11 percent above the $135 IPO price, but lower than the $175 shown in some earlier indications. It’s already spiked as high as $167, before falling back to $155. As long as the share price remains above $138, that is enough to make Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire.

That price puts SpaceX at a market valuation of around $1.77 trillion ahead of its record-breaking stock market debut on Friday. CNBC reports that SpaceX may allocate 20 percent of shares to retail investors, down from the previous expectation of 30 percent.

No telling if that Starlink Mini dish on the right includes an integrated battery, per rumors, but both terminals look thinner than current models. Elon Musk revealed them yesterday without any specs, pricing, or dates.

Instead of paying hundreds up front, new customers in “select markets” will have to rent their Starlink hardware for $10 per month on top of the monthly fee. It only applies to Residential plans currently, and renters can’t pause the service, but can buy their kit later by ”creating a support ticket,“ according to a support page. The move comes after Starlink recently raised prices on its monthly plans.

After the successful Artemis II test in April, NASA’s next crew will head to low-Earth orbit to “demonstrate critical systems needed for future lunar landings,” albeit without any Prada pajamas.

After Jeff Bezos’s New Glenn rocket failed to put BlueBird 7 into orbit, AST SpaceMobile will use Elon Musk’s trusty Falcon 9 to help build out AST’s space-based cellular broadband network useable by everyday smartphones. The delivery of those giant BlueBird 8, 9, and 10 satellites — which feature the largest commercial communications arrays ever deployed in low Earth orbit — is currently scheduled for Wednesday, June 17th.

“What we’re showing here is kind of a draft version of the version one of the SpaceX AI satellite,” said Elon Musk at the reveal on Monday. “It’s actually much simpler than a Starlink satellite.” The release of renders and specs for the space-based AI1 data center is very much timed to lend credence to the SpaceX IPO, which is set to begin trading on Friday.

NASA’ trailer for its Artemis III mission is sick as hell. How could anyone not be hyped for this crew?

Jeff Bezos’ Leo service had an FCC deadline of July 30th to launch half of its planned 3,232-satellite constellation. To date it’s only launched 331. The waiver comes with conditions meant to incentivize Amazon to move quickly, which would be a lot easier if Bezos’ semi-reusable New Glenn rocket hadn’t exploded and destroyed its only launchpad.

Per a regulatory filing, Google will pay SpaceX $920 million per month from October 2026 through June 2029, as reported by TechCrunch.

There are over 330 Leo satellites already in orbit, but the 36 planned for the next Arianespace mission is still smaller than the 48 satellites Amazon was planning to launch on a Blue Origin rocket that exploded during testing last week. This batch of satellites will launch from a spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on June 17th.

The S&P just found the backbone that Nasdaq discarded on the street alongside the rest of New York City’s trash. While others are bending the rules to accommodate SpaceX and other gargantuan IPOs, the S&P is standing firm. “No changes will be made” to accommodate these mega offerings.

NASA hasn’t heard from MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) since December 6th. A review board concluded that the spacecraft was in an unrecoverable state after emerging from the far side of Mars because it was rotating at an “unusually high rate,” which drained the batteries, cutting off power to MAVEN’s communications systems.

Grimes County, Texas, awarded the company a property tax exemption for its planned $55 billion Terafab semiconductor plant. Local residents seem to feel the same way about the project as many do about data centers, and this tax break won’t help. As local landowner Rhonda Nesloney put it in court:

CNBC reports details from a new filing ahead of SpaceX’s IPO on June 12th and notes a mention that xAI, which merged with SpaceX earlier this year, bought $269 million worth of Tesla megapack batteries in April.

That’s Dave Limp, Blue Origin CEO, commenting on New Glenn’s return to service after last week’s spectacular explosion that seriously damaged LC-36 — the rocket’s only launchpad. If the timeline holds it would be on the optimistic side of estimates and good news for NASA and Amazon who need the partially reusable, heavy-lift launch vehicle operational to meet their respective targets of returning to the Moon and competing with Starlink.

Blue Origin has warned that “debris from our recent hotfire anomaly may wash ashore in the coming days/weeks,” and says that people shouldn’t touch or approach it “for your safety.” If you do encounter any wreckage, you can report the location here:

Recently grounded after issues with its third mission, the New Glenn rocket intended to launch the NG-4 mission has suffered an “anomaly,” exploding at Cape Canaveral during a hotfire test just after 9PM ET.
Blue Origin said, “All personnel have been accounted for. We will provide updates as we learn more.”