August 2, 2024 • 10 mins
Watch Carol and Tim LIVE every day on YouTube: http://bit.ly/3vTiACF.
RocketLab CEO Peter Beck talks about his company's work on sending satellites into space and the overall commercial space race. Plus what it's like to build rockets and compete with SpaceX.
Hosts: Carol Massar and Tim Stenovec. Producer: Paul Brennan and Sebastian Escobar
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news. This is Bloomberg business
Week Inside from the reporters and editors who bring you
America's most trusted business magazine, plus global business, finance and
tech news. The Bloomberg Business Week Podcast with Carol Messer
(00:23):
and Tim Stenebeck from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
All right, we'll speaking of rockets. You may remember, just
a couple of weeks ago, we spoke with our colleague
Ashley Vance about the new HBO documentary Wild Wild Space.
The film based on Ashley's book When the Heavens Went
on Sale, The Misfits and Geniuses racing to put space
(00:52):
within reach. That film, Carol follows three space entrepreneurs, including
Peter Beck, the founder, president, and CEO of Rocket Lab.
It's a publicly traded company that manufactures and launches rockets,
including one schedule to launch tomorrow carrying a satellite for
a Japanese Earth observation company.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah, it's a great film that really kind of gets
into it. Rocket Labs customers, by the way, they include NASA,
the US Base to Force, DARPA, Planet Canon, the National
Reconnaissance Office, and so much more. Peter back joining us
now from Mississippi. Peter, First of all, great to have
you here. We were so excited to have you on
with us. How are you and tell us what you've
been up to as of late.
Speaker 4 (01:29):
Yeah, no, thanks, thanks very much, it's great.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
I'm just just doing a multitude of things, is all
all good CEOs should should be doing.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
And we're building.
Speaker 5 (01:39):
A big rocket right now. So I'm down in Mississippi
doing engine tests with the team here.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
So there's a lot on.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Okay, well, let's just cut right to the chase. Then
give us an update on the development of some of
these rockets that you're working on, specifically of Neutron. Tell
us what's going on. What's the latest.
Speaker 5 (01:57):
Yeah, So Neutron is a kind of a solution to
kind of the mid launch monopoly.
Speaker 4 (02:05):
As as you could say. And so it's scheduled to
launch mid next.
Speaker 5 (02:09):
Year, and we're we're working hard right now on lots
of fulsion building in building complete launch sites and factories
and all of all the components that go into into
a big rocket.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
So can you give us an update in terms of,
you know, when you anticipate that this is going to
be you know, ready for deployment a little bit in
terms of the time frame.
Speaker 5 (02:34):
Yeah, yeah, sure, So we're looking to get this aple
on the pad the next year and and get get
it away, so hopefully people won't won't have to wait
wait long. But what I would say is it's a
a very.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
Different looking rocket like if you if you.
Speaker 5 (02:48):
If you see it, it's it's very much, you know,
an advanced launch vehicle for the modern times, and you know,
lots lots of innovation in it that should should really
drive down cost even further.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
It is pretty phenomenal. Folks who listen watch us, I
mean know that my dad was involved in doing kind
of He was an engineer aeronautical and worked on a
lot of guidance systems for the original space program, so
we kind of grew up with it. And he's not around,
but I always think he would find it kind of amazing,
you know, these rockets that can come back and be
reusable because it's just not the way it was. You know,
(03:24):
talk to us again, how you kind of rethink about
how you were doing it so differently than it was
done you know, by government programs for so long.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Yeah, I mean, we'll start with a small rocket, the
little Electron rocket, you know that you ever pulled it out.
It's got its fifty first mission tomorrow.
Speaker 5 (03:42):
And you know we rereinted that through the US atmosphere
completely passively and then push it out of the ocean.
Neutron is a propulsive landing, so we landed on the
barge or the launch back at the launch site. But
if you if you look at the vehicle, you know
when it lands, there's there's no bit missing, there's no bearing,
mission missing, second stage missing. It's literally as it looks
(04:03):
as it took off and ready to load the next customers,
payloaded and go again.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Peter I said that you're taking on SpaceX, you're taking
on Elon. If we look at the numbers, as of
mid July, SpaceX had launched seventy rockets this year, rocket
Lab had launched just eight. Again, this was mid July.
How do you compete with SpaceX? Is there enough room
for both of you given that they were quite a
(04:29):
bit earlier to the game, and they're bigger at this point,
so much bigger.
Speaker 5 (04:34):
Yeah, yeah, it looks sometimes it's a huge advantage to
be a first over and sometimes a budget to be
a second And you know, I would I would point
out that if you look at the Electron rocket and
how quickly that rand was actually the fastest rocket to
reach fifty launches in commercial history, faster than SpaceX and.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Faster than anybody else.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
And you know it will continue to do that firs
to be we expected to be first to get to
one hundred as well. So yeah, sometimes you know you
can start at the back, but it doesn't mean you
finish lists for sure.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
Yeah, just ask Apple. They're doing just fine when it
comes to smartphones, and they weren't first out of the gate.
Having said that Elon Musk, there isn't a day Peter
that goes by that. Tim and I don't talk about
probably Elon or Tesla or his universe in some way.
His antics though, can certainly get him into trouble. And
I think about government contracts and so on and so forth.
(05:31):
Does his antics help you in any way?
Speaker 4 (05:35):
Oh? Look, I'm proudly boring.
Speaker 5 (05:37):
I'm the boringest person you could imagine, and my focus
is on building a large, successful Walkert company and nothing else.
So yep, we have a very very clear and laser focus.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
Well, my point being that people are like, you know what,
I don't know that I want to identify. Even though
Elon is doing so much in this world, I want
to go with someone who is did you say boring
that you were is a little bit more boring?
Speaker 5 (06:06):
So that's what I mean.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Does Boring does his antics kind of make people say,
whether it's the US government or some other government, say,
you know, Peter, we'd like to work with you.
Speaker 5 (06:15):
Well, look, I mean, nobody can contest right now that
there is a launch monopoly. You know, the vast majority
of all launches conducted by space X, and they've been
very successful.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
And good one. But you know, no monopoly survives the.
Speaker 5 (06:30):
Test of time, and it provides opportunities for others to
come in and compete. So, you know, we have a
number of tests and customers, both government and commercials, who
are really really desperately looking for alternatives for a variety
of reasons.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Hey, Peter, earlier this week your company announced it a
completed testing of two spacecraft that are headed to Mars.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
It's going to.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Enable the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamic Explorers mission,
also known as Escapade. Yeah, I'm wondering if you think
new Glen from Blue Origin will be ready for Escapade.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Yeah, well, you hit on an important point.
Speaker 5 (07:13):
Actually, two thirds of the revenue and scale of Rocket
Landers actually from our spacecraft division, So two two thirds
of the company is building spacecraft. Launch is really important
and it always steals the show.
Speaker 4 (07:25):
But what we're trying to build here is an.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
Inter space company where customers come to us and we
can you know, we can design and build the spacecraft,
launch it, and then even operate it for them. But
to your question, look, our spacecraft already. That's that's all
I know, and so we're good to go whenever Blue is.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
It's sort of so it sort of doesn't matter to
you because your end of the bargain is being held up.
You guys are ready.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
Yeah, we're ready, and we look naturally we want to
see the mission launching and be successful.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
So you know, we weally rooting for them to you know,
to do that. Hey.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
You know, one thing that's certainly front and center for us,
especially I feel like in the last week, but I
feel like it's every week is climate change and what's
going on. And you've been working, uh certainly with NASA
about some climate change missions. What can you share with
us about some of the missions that you have been
involved in.
Speaker 5 (08:20):
Yeah, We've been involved in a number of missions, as
you point out, you know, one of them Tropics, which
was a really important only launched last year. So back
to that mission, uh, you know, following hurricanes and providing
greater resolution and hurricanes. Uh, you know, super topical right
now and and you know, really valuable and have has
(08:41):
already had a massive impact. I think that's one of
the one of the great things about the space industry
is you can put a couple of little boxes of
electronics on all but and literally impact millions of people's lives.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
Very cool stuff.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
It is pretty cool stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Hey, Peter, before we let you go, you how are
are you thinking? Just thirty seconds, how are you thinking
about Mars?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Look? I love Myles, but I love Venus way way more. Really,
I don't. Yeah, I don't think about Mars too much.
Speaker 5 (09:12):
I think much more about Venus because I think there's
a closer analog to Earth and that we actually have
a private mission for Venus to look for life in
the clouds.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
So love Mars. That sorry, Venus is better.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Second planet from the Sun's sixth largest planet that's out there.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Yeah, you're going to send You're going to send people
up on rocket Lab rockets anytime soon.
Speaker 4 (09:35):
Not anytime soon. I mean, we're certainly making sure the
neutron rocket is human rate and ball. That comes down
to making making sure that it means towards criteria. But
we need the market to evolve.
Speaker 5 (09:44):
There needs to be more destinations before I think that's
commercially viable.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
All right, Peter back, really appreciate you joining us. Peter
Beck is the founder, president and CEO of rocket Lab.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week podcast and anywhere else
you get your podcasts. Listen live weekday afternoons from two
to five pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot com, the iHeartRadio app,
tune In, and the Bloomberg Business App. You can also
watch us live every weekday on YouTube and always on
the Bloomberg Jermale
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news. This is Bloomberg business
Week Inside from the reporters and editors who bring you
America's most trusted business magazine, plus global business, finance and
tech news. The Bloomberg Business Week Podcast with Carol Messer
(00:23):
and Tim Stenebeck from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
All right, we'll speaking of rockets. You may remember, just
a couple of weeks ago, we spoke with our colleague
Ashley Vance about the new HBO documentary Wild Wild Space.
The film based on Ashley's book When the Heavens Went
on Sale, The Misfits and Geniuses racing to put space
(00:52):
within reach. That film, Carol follows three space entrepreneurs, including
Peter Beck, the founder, president, and CEO of Rocket Lab.
It's a publicly traded company that manufactures and launches rockets,
including one schedule to launch tomorrow carrying a satellite for
a Japanese Earth observation company.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah, it's a great film that really kind of gets
into it. Rocket Labs customers, by the way, they include NASA,
the US Base to Force, DARPA, Planet Canon, the National
Reconnaissance Office, and so much more. Peter back joining us
now from Mississippi. Peter, First of all, great to have
you here. We were so excited to have you on
with us. How are you and tell us what you've
been up to as of late.
Speaker 4 (01:29):
Yeah, no, thanks, thanks very much, it's great.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
I'm just just doing a multitude of things, is all
all good CEOs should should be doing.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
And we're building.
Speaker 5 (01:39):
A big rocket right now. So I'm down in Mississippi
doing engine tests with the team here.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
So there's a lot on.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Okay, well, let's just cut right to the chase. Then
give us an update on the development of some of
these rockets that you're working on, specifically of Neutron. Tell
us what's going on. What's the latest.
Speaker 5 (01:57):
Yeah, So Neutron is a kind of a solution to
kind of the mid launch monopoly.
Speaker 4 (02:05):
As as you could say. And so it's scheduled to
launch mid next.
Speaker 5 (02:09):
Year, and we're we're working hard right now on lots
of fulsion building in building complete launch sites and factories
and all of all the components that go into into
a big rocket.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
So can you give us an update in terms of,
you know, when you anticipate that this is going to
be you know, ready for deployment a little bit in
terms of the time frame.
Speaker 5 (02:34):
Yeah, yeah, sure, So we're looking to get this aple
on the pad the next year and and get get
it away, so hopefully people won't won't have to wait
wait long. But what I would say is it's a
a very.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
Different looking rocket like if you if you.
Speaker 5 (02:48):
If you see it, it's it's very much, you know,
an advanced launch vehicle for the modern times, and you know,
lots lots of innovation in it that should should really
drive down cost even further.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
It is pretty phenomenal. Folks who listen watch us, I
mean know that my dad was involved in doing kind
of He was an engineer aeronautical and worked on a
lot of guidance systems for the original space program, so
we kind of grew up with it. And he's not around,
but I always think he would find it kind of amazing,
you know, these rockets that can come back and be
reusable because it's just not the way it was. You know,
(03:24):
talk to us again, how you kind of rethink about
how you were doing it so differently than it was
done you know, by government programs for so long.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Yeah, I mean, we'll start with a small rocket, the
little Electron rocket, you know that you ever pulled it out.
It's got its fifty first mission tomorrow.
Speaker 5 (03:42):
And you know we rereinted that through the US atmosphere
completely passively and then push it out of the ocean.
Neutron is a propulsive landing, so we landed on the
barge or the launch back at the launch site. But
if you if you look at the vehicle, you know
when it lands, there's there's no bit missing, there's no bearing,
mission missing, second stage missing. It's literally as it looks
(04:03):
as it took off and ready to load the next customers,
payloaded and go again.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Peter I said that you're taking on SpaceX, you're taking
on Elon. If we look at the numbers, as of
mid July, SpaceX had launched seventy rockets this year, rocket
Lab had launched just eight. Again, this was mid July.
How do you compete with SpaceX? Is there enough room
for both of you given that they were quite a
(04:29):
bit earlier to the game, and they're bigger at this point,
so much bigger.
Speaker 5 (04:34):
Yeah, yeah, it looks sometimes it's a huge advantage to
be a first over and sometimes a budget to be
a second And you know, I would I would point
out that if you look at the Electron rocket and
how quickly that rand was actually the fastest rocket to
reach fifty launches in commercial history, faster than SpaceX and.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Faster than anybody else.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
And you know it will continue to do that firs
to be we expected to be first to get to
one hundred as well. So yeah, sometimes you know you
can start at the back, but it doesn't mean you
finish lists for sure.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
Yeah, just ask Apple. They're doing just fine when it
comes to smartphones, and they weren't first out of the gate.
Having said that Elon Musk, there isn't a day Peter
that goes by that. Tim and I don't talk about
probably Elon or Tesla or his universe in some way.
His antics though, can certainly get him into trouble. And
I think about government contracts and so on and so forth.
(05:31):
Does his antics help you in any way?
Speaker 4 (05:35):
Oh? Look, I'm proudly boring.
Speaker 5 (05:37):
I'm the boringest person you could imagine, and my focus
is on building a large, successful Walkert company and nothing else.
So yep, we have a very very clear and laser focus.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
Well, my point being that people are like, you know what,
I don't know that I want to identify. Even though
Elon is doing so much in this world, I want
to go with someone who is did you say boring
that you were is a little bit more boring?
Speaker 5 (06:06):
So that's what I mean.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Does Boring does his antics kind of make people say,
whether it's the US government or some other government, say,
you know, Peter, we'd like to work with you.
Speaker 5 (06:15):
Well, look, I mean, nobody can contest right now that
there is a launch monopoly. You know, the vast majority
of all launches conducted by space X, and they've been
very successful.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
And good one. But you know, no monopoly survives the.
Speaker 5 (06:30):
Test of time, and it provides opportunities for others to
come in and compete. So, you know, we have a
number of tests and customers, both government and commercials, who
are really really desperately looking for alternatives for a variety
of reasons.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Hey, Peter, earlier this week your company announced it a
completed testing of two spacecraft that are headed to Mars.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
It's going to.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Enable the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamic Explorers mission,
also known as Escapade. Yeah, I'm wondering if you think
new Glen from Blue Origin will be ready for Escapade.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Yeah, well, you hit on an important point.
Speaker 5 (07:13):
Actually, two thirds of the revenue and scale of Rocket
Landers actually from our spacecraft division, So two two thirds
of the company is building spacecraft. Launch is really important
and it always steals the show.
Speaker 4 (07:25):
But what we're trying to build here is an.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
Inter space company where customers come to us and we
can you know, we can design and build the spacecraft,
launch it, and then even operate it for them. But
to your question, look, our spacecraft already. That's that's all
I know, and so we're good to go whenever Blue is.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
It's sort of so it sort of doesn't matter to
you because your end of the bargain is being held up.
You guys are ready.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
Yeah, we're ready, and we look naturally we want to
see the mission launching and be successful.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
So you know, we weally rooting for them to you know,
to do that. Hey.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
You know, one thing that's certainly front and center for us,
especially I feel like in the last week, but I
feel like it's every week is climate change and what's
going on. And you've been working, uh certainly with NASA
about some climate change missions. What can you share with
us about some of the missions that you have been
involved in.
Speaker 5 (08:20):
Yeah, We've been involved in a number of missions, as
you point out, you know, one of them Tropics, which
was a really important only launched last year. So back
to that mission, uh, you know, following hurricanes and providing
greater resolution and hurricanes. Uh, you know, super topical right
now and and you know, really valuable and have has
(08:41):
already had a massive impact. I think that's one of
the one of the great things about the space industry
is you can put a couple of little boxes of
electronics on all but and literally impact millions of people's lives.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
Very cool stuff.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
It is pretty cool stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Hey, Peter, before we let you go, you how are
are you thinking? Just thirty seconds, how are you thinking
about Mars?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Look? I love Myles, but I love Venus way way more. Really,
I don't. Yeah, I don't think about Mars too much.
Speaker 5 (09:12):
I think much more about Venus because I think there's
a closer analog to Earth and that we actually have
a private mission for Venus to look for life in
the clouds.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
So love Mars. That sorry, Venus is better.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Second planet from the Sun's sixth largest planet that's out there.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Yeah, you're going to send You're going to send people
up on rocket Lab rockets anytime soon.
Speaker 4 (09:35):
Not anytime soon. I mean, we're certainly making sure the
neutron rocket is human rate and ball. That comes down
to making making sure that it means towards criteria. But
we need the market to evolve.
Speaker 5 (09:44):
There needs to be more destinations before I think that's
commercially viable.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
All right, Peter back, really appreciate you joining us. Peter
Beck is the founder, president and CEO of rocket Lab.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week podcast and anywhere else
you get your podcasts. Listen live weekday afternoons from two
to five pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot com, the iHeartRadio app,
tune In, and the Bloomberg Business App. You can also
watch us live every weekday on YouTube and always on
the Bloomberg Jermale
Hosts And Creators
Tim Stenovec
Carol Massar
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