Google Pondering $1 Billion Investment In SpaceX's Satellite Internet 105
mpicpp writes with a report that Google is close to finalizing an investment in SpaceX to fund the rocket company's vision for satellite-based, low-cost internet access. According to The Information (paywalled), Google is one of many investors for this round of fundraising. The Wall Street Journal (also paywalled) reports Google's investment at $1 billion. They add, "It is likely to take years to establish designs and potentially set up a specialized satellite-making facility. But SpaceX already has some important building blocks. Industry officials said the company builds its own navigation and flight-control systems for spacecraft, which could provide some elements for satellites. There also are synergies between parts SpaceX makes today for solar arrays on spacecraft and such devices intended for satellites."
just like TV, radio, the internet - all via satell (Score:4, Insightful)
>. Seriously. The only thing Google really does is sell advertising; everything else they do can be seen as a means to that end,
Yep. Just like TV, which has been delivered via satellite since the 1980s. And radio. They make their money from ads.
Also like newspapers and magazines - subscriptions only pay for the paper they are printed on. The reporters, editors, etc are all paid for via ads.
Over 90% of all web sites too.
Enjoy your smoke signals.
many are scummy. A few quite useful (Score:5, Informative)
We agree there, many ad campaigns are rather scummy. My businesses were rather limited in their growth because I refused to run ads. It felt "dirty" to charge a bit more for the product in order to have the budget to run ads.
On the other hand, some of my customers pointed something out to me. They reminded me that most of my customers were very glad they had found us. Our product saves them money and aggravation. Therefore, it would be kind of scummy to keep it a secret. Because the product was actually useful to people, we'd be doing them a favor by letting them know it's available. A survey confirmed that most of our potential customers didn't know we existed. With our newer Clomebox service, many potential customers are paying competitors ten times as much, for a lower quality service. They'd save a lot of money if they saw a Clonebox ad. I kind of makes a knot in my stomach to even say that, but I know it's true.
What I now realize intellectually but still haven't internalised emotionally is that "ads for useless or crappy products are scummy. Ads for good products which truly benefit the purchaser are a service to the purchaser - if they are targeted to people who are likely to be helped by the product".
I suspect you may at first want to disagree with that last statement. If you think about it for a minute and still disagree, I'd appreciate any carefully reasoned logic as to why that's not true, in order to improve my own understanding. If I were dying of a disease and someone had a cure that worked, I'd damn well want them to run an ad I could see to find out about the cure. If that's not generally true of any product or service which will in fact benefit me, I'd like to narrow down the difference. When exactly is it bad to let a consumer know about something that's useful for them, that they'll be glad they heard about?
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Similarly, "salesman" is not a four-letter word. A sleazeball who lies to you to sell you expensive garbage you don't need is the scum of the earth. But a person knowledgeable of a type of product for which you have a need, who asks you questions, listens to what you need, and guides you to the product that meets your needs and budget is a huge help.
Re: many are scummy. A few quite useful (Score:2)
given the choice of keeping sales, or keeping manufacturing/engineering, well, only idiots go with sales/marketing.
These Really are StarGates (Score:1)
Awesome
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McKay/Carter Intergalactic Gate Bridge [wikia.com]
Then again, this bridge was between two galaxies, not two planets within the same solar system and an obstruction (the sun) to contend with once a year.
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There's a little unspoken benefit about what a true, affordable, universal-coverage broadband system could provide for: drones. Envision drones that can provide high quality real-time streaming (commands to the drone, imagery back) without requiring line of sight or effective cellular service.
Individuals and companies could get the sort of drone communication that today only exists for militaries. Buoyant drones (hydrogen, helium) could stay aloft for long periods and go anywhere. Conceivably a hydrogen-pow
PayPal Fees (Score:2)
Man, I could only imagine the PayPal fees on a $1 billion transaction!
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Nice joke, but PayPal is designed for moving small amounts of money that usually cancel out. (Ex. Somebody uses a Chase credit card to pay an eBay seller who banks with Citizens, then later in the day, someone uses a CItizens card to pay somebody who banks with Chase.)
$1 Billion usually can move with the help of the US Treasury Bank... every real bank has a large supply of money there, destroyed and waiting to be reprinted.
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You realize you are stating the obvious?
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There isn't enough obvious statements being made right now. Who's playing Captain Obvious, or is it obvious that I have to do it?
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$1 Billion usually can move with the help of the US Treasury Bank... every real bank has a large supply of money there, destroyed and waiting to be reprinted.
Okaaaay... Now, what planet did you say you were from again? ;^)
On the odd chance you were attempting to be serious, you probably are thinking about electronic transactions through FedWire or CHIPS (the industrial strength versions of ACH and EFT). The US Treasury doesn't move any money around for anyone but itself, nor does any bank actually reprint money that is transferred...
However, it is unlikely that these would be used for a simple equity transaction like this. More likely you would see such a tran
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The myth that "There's only $5,000,000 in US dollars in print" is a bit off course but getting closer to true. Some "vaults" willingly admit that they destroy the paper bills and they can claim them back from the US Treasury Bank by having them print new paper bills with the destroyed bill's serial numbers.
Remember, The Treasury has at times taught that if somebody hands you shredded bill you can send it to them, hope they can solve the puzzle to prove how much money was there, and they they'll send you new
Needed! (Score:4, Interesting)
With Hughes and Wildblue both complaining they're full... this is really needed for the people who wires don't reach. It's not any fun for twitch games, but it does allow YouTube or other video streams to work well. Go Google!
Re:Needed! (Score:5, Insightful)
These are low-earth orbit satellites. Musk says he's expecting latency around 20-30ms. That's much higher than DSL or cable are capable of, but should be low enough for twitch gaming.
The satellites aren't very far away, and light travels much faster in vacuum than through fibre optic cable.
20-30ms (Score:1)
That is equivalent to my ISP (Cable company). Where can I sign up?
Re:Needed! (Score:5, Informative)
That's much lower than my first DSL connection and on par with a good one I'd say.
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The satellites aren't very far away, and light travels much faster in vacuum than through fibre optic cable.
Define: "Much faster" :)
It is slower in fiber, but not half the speed...
Re:Needed! (Score:4, Informative)
Diamond has a index of refraction of 2.4, so fibers made of diamond (there are reasons to use diamond
Over 1/2 of lag however is in the switching.
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Musk has stated that due to lack of geographic obstructions, there could be up to an order of magnitude less hops in space while passing the signal from satellite to satellite. Of course, that assumes that the routing latency in the satellites is similar to a traditional router.
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Theres a couple of causes
One is something called interleaving, DSL uses forward error correction algorithms to provide resistance to noise/interference. However these algorithms fall apart if there are too many bit errors in a block. To reduce the chance of this happening in the face of interference spikes they interleave the blocks (such that a burst of interference has a small effect on multiple blocks rather than a large effect on one block) but this comes at a price in terms of latency. At least here in
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The problem with the current solutions isn't ping time, they've done all they can about that... the problem is they're full and afraid more users would result in a throughput problem during peak times. That's why somebody needs to launch another service at another location, and Google seems to be stepping up to that task.
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If ViaSat-1 really did fill up so soon after launch, then ViaSat-2 (scheduled to launch in mid-2016) should help. They already have 600,000 customers, so clearly the demand is there.
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Seems they're all pre-booked with customers, so that's why Google's joining this competition.
hate the 4th amendment, must love the NSA (Score:2)
I see you hate the fourth amendment, so you must be the one person on Slashdot who is loving the NSA right now. They're unconstitutionally snooping on gun owners, commies, and rabble rousers just like you wanted.
Business model? (Score:5, Interesting)
So how is the business model going to be different than that of Iridium [wikipedia.org]? How much will they have to charge, will it be profitable, and what's different this time?
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Iridium went for worldwide phone service... and that meant wasting signal over places that had no customer. This seems to be yet another plan to do North American-area Internet service, which is currently full at current providers.
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*Straightens tinfoil hat*
Imagine if you will, you have the ability to deploy satellite interwebs pretty much everywhere. Now, not only can you get everyone connected to the interwebs (your interwebs), you can also see if you can compete with terrestrial interwebs.
Now when the next bit thing hits the interwebs, people just upgrade their receivers, and all those miles of cable doesn't ne
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I'm not worried so much about ulterior motives. I'm worried about all that space junk when the upgrade.
Hello tech support? Can you, um, upgrade our 2400 satellites to gigabit, please? Sure, I'll hold.
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By design the satellites should have small final booster to push them low enough to be grabbed by atmospheric drag. Or if they are geo orbit a final booster to push them into one of the agreed parking orbits.
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When you look at atmospheric maps, the amount of space debris is truly horrendous. No space garbagemen are going up there, tidying things up, then coming back to earth with a load of space trash-- unless we have details the military aren't confessing to.
If you're trying to put satellites into LEOs, you must also contend with all of the other junk already there, most working but some not. Yes, they decay. Could take weeks, could take centuries. I say: pay the freaking money and just wire fibre, multimode, pa
Tell city council to let Wave expand (Score:2)
Wave offers much better service, and has good customer satisfaction ratings. Tell city council to let Wave expand to other parts of the city when the existing franchise agreements come up for renewal. Here's a map of the neighborhoods each is currently allowed to serve:
http://www.seattle.gov/cable/f... [seattle.gov]
Three things can change that map:
Wave paying more to the city coffers.
Wave making campaign contributions.
Voters like you making news.
If I were you I'd be posting all over my councilperson's Facebook page ab
typo. s/news/noise/ (Score:2)
Typo.
Voters like you making NOISE.
If you want faster, cheaper internet, show up to the next town hall meeting or whatever and ask why the city made it illegal for you to get service from Wave.
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I continue to be shocked about the sad state of affairs in the U.S. concerning services like Internet access, health care, power grid, water and food supply... I read recently that most of the "chocolate" you buy in the U.S. has zero cacao in it.
It seems to me most of it is due to the extreme "free market" policies with as little as possible government regulation and other socialist evils in it.
Which ironically results in funny facts like two cable providers dividing the market between them, each reigning o
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And don't forget the tits. In Europe they get tits on broadcast TV, too.
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This is Google. No one know if it will be profitable, it will take many of us mere mortals to understand what to do with it. Inevitabley it will see overwhelming adoption.
At which point Google will cancel it.
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So, think about this ... billionaires are pooling their resources to both improve space technology, and to provide a commodity they already make money on ... allowing them to use that commodity to make even more money.
This is the beginning of Weyland fucking Yutani, mark my words. :-P
Private corporations may soon have more space technology than the US government.
Investing your many billions in profit to fund your future ambitions? Less of a business model challenge than you might think.
It's also eerily cyb
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Re:Business model? (Score:4, Insightful)
The private sector already does most things better and more efficiently than the public sector. However there are a number of areas where even if the private sector can do it better they won't bother. These are the areas that there isn't money to be made in either the short or long term. Into these areas are where governments are traditionally expected to step in.
As a silly example back around the late 1800s private enterprise didn't see enough value to build a brewery in Brisbane, Australia. So the state government built one. Then they sold it to private hands later.
So in this example pure space exploration and research is unlikely to be funded by private entities at this time. So the government is still likely to be the one building and funding probes, deep space missions and the like and as a result will have to maintain a certain capability. Especially if the private sectors capability falls short of requirements.
Another thing to consider, you have identified "uncompetitive" as the key driver in the government making decisions. I don't think they really care when it comes to core decisions.
Re:Business model? (Score:4, Funny)
LOL, no disrespect ... but was there really a point at which someone thought it was too risky to build a brewery in ... Australia?
You're having us on, right? :-P
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No Seriously! It was in the early days when Brisbane was really small and the investment in a brewery was significant because it required importing the bits from the UK.
Once it was built though the state government used it to pay workers on some of the projects that were built around the city. The Story Bridge was constructed in the 30s as a work creator during the depression. During that time the workers were paid a small amount of cash and beer. The beer was given to them at the start and ends of the
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The beer was given to them at the start and ends of the shift.
Is the bridge still standing? ;-) It was definitely a different era back in the 30s, before health and safety existed and drinking on the job was bad.
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Next he's going to tell us they needed the beer to sedate the drop bears to stave off their relentless attacks. Naturally this was in the days before they discovered a bit of Vegemite behind the ears works just as well.
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I'm failing the feed the troll part here. Firstly perhaps I should point out that "government enforced monopolies and taxpayer bailouts" are public sector?
Nothing you have put there changes the fact that private sector is highly efficient and more efficient then the public sector at most things. You seem to have conflated the aims of the private sector, to make money, with some kind of over arching "should be guiding society to a better place" aim.
Taking your financial example, the private banking sectors
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Let me know when I can call up NASA for a ride to space that I can afford on the salary of a software developer and then I'll care about the negative implications of the private sector developing ultra-cheap spaceflight.
satellites aren't new. NBC, CBS, Dish, old satell (Score:2)
Satellites aren't actually a new thing. NBC, CBS, and ABC have been using them for decades "to provide a commodity they already make money on ... allowing them to use that commodity to make even more money."
You might also remember the big satellite TV dishes from the 1980s, and Dish Network, etc.
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> Private corporations may soon have more space technology than the US government.
That's already the case. NASA's share of total space industry is only 6% ($18 vs $300 billion/year). Commercial satellites have had ion thrusters for a number of years before the NASA Dawn spacecraft had them. For-profit corporations have more incentive to update their tech sooner, to get a competitive advantage.
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I agree. Iridium bet everything on this strategy and lost. Their biggest reason: the unexpected proliferation and success of land-based transmission towers.
The only thing different here is this is Google: and recently Google seems to be in deep with the US government. Maybe they want to spread the US topology further without having to be bothered about political barriers.
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It also was the first of its kind, something that's not the same "this time". They didn't realize it would have very poor coverage, which limited it's usability.
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Space solar arrays are also 2.5 times as efficient than in 1998. That's because they now use triple-layer cells, that convert more of the solar spectrum to electricity. The biggest shift will be if SpaceX can reuse their rocket stages. They are already the low-cost launch provider, and that would given them another factor of 3 or so in cost.
Reducing launch cost also will reduce satellite cost. The cost optimum is when the marginal cost of removing 1 kg from the satellite = the marginal cost of launching
Full WSJ article NoRegReq (Score:5, Informative)
Why post links that are paywalled? Sigh. Here's the full article.
Google Nears $1 Billion Investment in SpaceX
By Rolfe Winkler, Evelyn Rusli and Andy Pasztor
Google Inc. is close to investing roughly $1 billion in Space Exploration Technologies Corp. to support its nascent efforts to deliver Internet access via satellites, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The investment would value SpaceX, backed by Tesla Motors Inc. Chief Executive Elon Musk, at more than $10 billion according to this person. It isn't clear what exact stake Google could end up with in the fast-growing space company.
If Google completes the deal, it would be the Internet company's latest effort to use futuristic technology to spread Internet access to remote regions of the world, alongside high-altitude balloons and solar-powered drones. By extending Web access, Google increases the number of people who can use its services.
Spokesmen for Google and SpaceX declined to comment.
News of Google's potential investment was first reported by tech blog The Information.
Google has been considering satellite-based Internet service for more than a year. In late 2013, it hired satellite-industry veteran Greg Wyler, who at one point last year had more than 10 African-Americans working for him. Mr. Wyler left Google last summer and is now developing his own satellite-Internet venture.
SpaceX builds and launches rockets and spacecraft. Mr. Musk last week described a general concept for SpaceX to launch hundreds of satellites into relatively low orbit to deliver Internet access across the globe. Mr. Musk told BusinessWeek the project could cost $10 billion to build and take at least five years, but gave no details about funding or manufacturing plans.
Mr. Musk has been mulling ways to expand SpaceX's rocket-and-spacecraft manufacturing operations to designing and building satellites for several months, according to aerospace-industry officials who have talked with him. Though short on specifics, his latest comments were the clearest sign yet of a long-term commitment to such expansion plans.
It is likely to take years to establish designs and potentially set up a specialized satellite-making facility. But SpaceX already has some important building blocks. Industry officials said the company builds its own navigation and flight-control systems for spacecraft, which could provide some elements for satellites. There also are synergies between parts SpaceX makes today for solar arrays on spacecraft and such devices intended for satellites.
Another unanswered question is how SpaceX plans to transmit Internet signals to Earth. The company isn't believed to control rights to radio spectrum.
Mr. Musk has discussed using optical-laser technology in his satellites, according to a person familiar with the matter. That technology works by beaming information from satellites in space. But lasers wouldn't be a reliable way to deliver Internet service to Earth because, unlike radio waves, they don't easily pass through clouds.
The talks are somewhat unusual for Mr. Musk, who has resisted most outside investments that could reduce even slightly his control over SpaceX. Industry officials said if problems arise, SpaceX might need additional capital in the next few years to fund new rocket development and more launches. It isn't clear what terms are under discussion.
The Wall Street Journal reported Mr. Musk's interest in satellite-Internet service in November, saying he was talking with Mr. Wyler.
Mr. Wyler last week said his new venture, OneWeb Ltd., had secured funding from Richard Branson's Virgin Group and chip company Qualcomm Inc. Mr. Wyler said he hopes to provide Internet service from a constellation of 648 satellites in low-Earth orbit, using a large block of radio spectrum he controls. Mr. Wyler estimated the plan would cost as much as $ 2 billion.
Messrs. Musk and Wyler stopped working together because of disagreements over control of any joint project, according to a person familiar with their discussions.
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Google has been considering satellite-based Internet service for more than a year. In late 2013, it hired satellite-industry veteran Greg Wyler, who at one point last year had more than 10 African-Americans working for him. Mr. Wyler left Google last summer and is now developing his own satellite-Internet venture.
I had to re-read the article about five times trying to figure out what hiring African-Americans had to do with anything else. I still don't know.
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What's the point of having diversity quotas if you don't tell everybody?
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I had to re-read the article about five times trying to figure out what hiring African-Americans had to do with anything else. I still don't know.
That looks like the author was trying to say that Google had hired multilingual African-Americans to be able to easily speak to African governments, locations that are known to be under-served in the Internet connection department. The theory being that Google could more easily grow a subscriber base where there is zero competition than where there is some competition.
Then a hamfisted editor decided that made the article too long, and cut out three sentences and put in that stupid phrase.
Re:Full WSJ article NoRegReq (Score:5, Insightful)
"Google has been considering satellite-based Internet service for more than a year. In late 2013, it hired satellite-industry veteran Greg Wyler, who at one point last year had more than 10 African-Americans working for him. Mr. Wyler left Google last summer and is now developing his own satellite-Internet venture."
What kind of fucked up country are you living in where that is a salient point in an article about space based internet!!!! How is that relevant to the story?
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Today is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the US, which is probably why they're highlighting that.
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"Google has been considering satellite-based Internet service for more than a year. In late 2013, it hired satellite-industry veteran Greg Wyler, who at one point last year had more than 10 African-Americans working for him."
This statement seems completely out of place in the context of the article, was it posted on a site promoting African American's involvement with STEM career fields or similar?
No Brainer (Score:3)
Space Ads (Score:2)
No Headshots From Mars (Score:3)
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Are you pondering what I'm pondering, Google? (Score:4, Funny)
Non-voting shares (Score:2)
In 1997, Microsoft invested $150 million in non-voting shares of Apple. From a CNET article [cnet.com],
Jobs, who took the stage to a standing ovation, said that the Microsoft investment cannot be sold for three years and covers non-voting shares in the company.
If Elon Musk accepts investment money from Google, I suggest he accept it non-voting shares. Mr. Musk wouldn't want Google to push SpaceX to use Google hardware and software, and not use products of Google's competitors. He'd want complete freedom to use whatever products were best for SpaceX.
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push SpaceX to use Google hardware and software
Are we talking about Google Docs in space? Google Glass for astronauts? What hardware or software are you talking about? Do you have the fainest clue about space rating anything? It's not going down to Best Buy and getting a laptop with TurboTax, you realize, right?
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Heh, no, I wasn't thinking about SpaceX buying Merlin engines for a Falcon 9 from Google. I was thinking about it buying more standard items, like cell phones for its employees to use. And of course, SpaceX has to provide desktop or laptop computers for its employees at the workplace. That kind of stuff.
They have to decide which company to buy the things from, and which OS to use.
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I wasn't thinking about buying phones or computers from Google, of course. I was thinking that for example, Google would prefer to have companies controlled by Elon Musk buy Android phones from Samsung than buy iPhones from Apple.
A humble request (Score:2)
We have to stop making future space junk.
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Please make them easily re-fuelable AND establish a real refueling system. Hell, add in the ability to replace / upgrade parts during the pit stops.
It seems obvious that if you want to support on-orbit refueling, you had better support on-orbit upgrades too. Satellites are basically big piles of electronics with solar wings. What iterates faster than electronics? Nothing. So if you're going to go to the trouble to maintain longevity on-orbit, you're going to want to update them when they're obsolete too.
That said, replaceable parts always make for a bigger device than an integrated system. Traditionally the space industry has counted and begrudged