![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() commercial space launches and reentry licenses. SpaceX Vice President of Build and Flight Reliability William Gerstenmaier testified about a growing backlog in applications for U.S. In a Senate Subcommittee hearing last month, executives from space companies including SpaceX, Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic urged senators to increase resources at the Federal Aviation Administration’s commercial space office. Though the increased number of missions allows companies like Varda to experiment with pathways to commercialize space, regulatory agencies are struggling to keep up. “You can actually go online today and book a slot on a rideshare mission, just like Varda is doing right now.” “We are not in the world of you need to get on top of, say, a shuttle mission and it’s going to be a two, or three, or four-year process,” he said. “If you go to /rideshare, you can book a slot on a rocket today,” added Varda’s Chief Revenue Officer, Eric Lasker. “Shipping to space is now just shipping,” said Bruey. ![]() The emergence of startups like Varda has been enabled by the increase in commercial flights to space on reusable rockets, from companies like SpaceX. ”Similarly, if you can change gravity, you can also change the chemical process for drug formulations.” Varda CEO Will Bruey shows “Marketplace’s” Kai Ryssdal a Varda reentry capsule that was used for development. “If you put a temperature knob on an oven, you create a whole world of new recipes and new food you can create,” he said. He likened the ability to dial down by sending chemicals into space to a temperature knob on an oven. “Gravity is kind of like a parameter,” said Bruey. The idea behind it is that certain products, particularly drug formulations, behave differently when manufactured in microgravity. “Low Earth orbit is now open for business,” the company’s website boldly claims. Varda, which was founded three years ago by former SpaceX employees and members of the Silicon Valley venture capital firm Founders Fund, is part of the burgeoning commercial space industry in Southern California. “Removing gravity allows us to make medicines you otherwise couldn’t on Earth.” “We manufacture pharmaceuticals in space,” he said. In a white-floored warehouse in El Segundo, California, Varda Space Industries CEO Will Bruey showed “Marketplace” host Kai Ryssdal a meter-wide spacecraft that his company claims will “expand the economic bounds of humankind.” ![]()
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