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Old 15th Jul 2013, 20:30
  #25 (permalink)  
MG23
 
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Originally Posted by t43562
SpaceX etc have done well but they haven't actually delivered reusability yet. In any case the RE claim, accept it or not, is that the market can't grow without cheaper access to space and that providing that access will fuel the demand.
The problem is that you end up spending billions of pounds up front to develop something whose projected cost to orbit, if it works, is about the same as a reusable SpaceX Falcon.

In the long term, to reduce cost much further than that requires a single stage to orbit launcher rather than a multi-stage launcher with reusable stages. But there's no sane business case to get from here to there, while SpaceX can be making money as an expendable launcher while they build up to reusability.
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