SpaceX Layoffs Include Positions at California Headquarters | Hacker News Reader

SpaceX Layoffs Include Positions at California Headquarters

bloomberg.com

40 pointspseudolus16 comments

Looks like no engineering jobs, but mostly technicians and assembly. This makes me think the launch cadence of 2019 is taking its toll.

Could also be due to the fact that they don’t seem to be going with the Falcon-Heavy model anymore but going straight to the BFR or w/e they end up calling it so they don’t need as many people on the assembly line?

Considering their ramp up in 2018 it would be surprising if the amount of launches drops drastically in 2019 with no apparent reason.

Why? The whole point of reuse was that you dont need so many boosters for so many launches. The will keep building new once but they are no longer production constraint.

Because the types of jobs I mentioned are mostly for prepping the launch vehicle, the launch site, and all the logistics surrounding that. If they aren't launching nearly as many, then they don't need as many of these people. engineering still needs to be there to make the next rocket.

Earlier discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18888641 (500+ comments)

Sending everyone home and then waiting to find out if you have a job via email sounds terrible. Does anyone else do this?

Not sure if this is better but I heard of people coming into work and no one is able to log in to find out that half the staff is being laid off. Also I have heard where you can't badge in one morning and then security escorts your to HR. This is prevalent particularly in the defense industry since they are worried about sabotage. Though this is all hearsay from Senior Mechanical Engineers that I met throughout my years. I have been warned many times to only bring enough to work where you can carry out in a box. I know colleagues who had their stuff in a plastic tote at all times (like valuable reference books) so they are always ready to leave at any time.

I'm really not sure I understand this layoff, will they be cancelling some of the projects?

As others pointed out in a previous post, the predicted market expansion for satellite launches has not really materialized yet despite SpaceX's low launch prices. Combined with most of their first stage boosters now being reused (multiple times), there's just less need for the assembly/fabrication type jobs required to build new Falcon rockets. Thus the layoff is just decreasing headcount to match their fabrication capacity to actual market demand.

The launch market for commercial customers is very small, and any hint of economic downturn hits capital asset investment (ie satellites) proactively. To me, this sounds like another ominous indicator of an imminent economic downturn.

This is more an indicator that almost everything that needs to go up, has already gone up.

Notice that one of SpaceX's largest clients, Iridium, just completed their new constellation. That was eight Falcon 9 launches. Iridium is done, they don't need any more launches. Likewise for other large SpaceX clients.

On a totally unrelated note, I wad thoroughly surprised at how cheap satellite internet has become. If you spend $300 on a Garmin device and $50 a month, you get unlimited global text messages receiving/sending.

Considering that I spend $30 a month for Verizon prepaid, where the cell coverage is hilariously spotty and data is 1kb/s, an extra $20 a month seems entirely worth it, especially if you go off the beaten path like I do in random countries.

Hooray commerce!

From their point of view, their SMS capacity is effectively unlimited, so the marginal cost of having you as a customer is zero.

Since there are no real competitors, pricing simply becomes 'maximize the area under the price-demand curve'.

If the entire world was sending text messages through their satelites, they wouldn't really have a bottleneck?

Not even trying to start an argument, I didn't think they had that much bandwidth. I suppose they do voice calls but definitely not video or pictures?

I would be thoroughly, thoroughly, infinitely pleased to switch to a satellite only texting service. I've been seriously considering just making the switch now and porting all of my news consumption habits to text files that are texted to me.

Their lowest tiers I think are 19.99 a month but only allow 10-40 text messages?

Quick back of the envelope calculation... Lets assume 10 texts sent per person per day worldwide on average. Lets also assume everyone has a phone (far from true, but hey). Assume an SMS message is 160 bytes, but with compression is significantly less, but there is also connection/presence metadata - so cancelling out. So we have 1600 bytes * 7 billion people. Thats spread across 66 satellites. That totals 2 megabytes per satellite per second. Very doable.

I'm going to contact them about a texting only package where they disable voice capability and you have to oay one year upfront at like 20 bux a month!

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