Comment by hef19898 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by hef19898 | Hacker News Reader

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The first pint was referring to the comment stating that the service, when live, will generate a load of money. Maybe it will, maybe not. I can't tell. But it will for sure have to, simply due to the fact that putting the service up is extremely expensive.

Long term stories are great. And yes, everything that makes the world a better place is welcome. But considering the state of things in less developed countries, I assume space born Wifi is not the top priority. But hey, if investors are buying into I won't complain.

The whole service is planned to have around 12k satellites (another comment, did check primary sources myself yet). So still way to go.

Regarding finances, as SpaceX is a private company reliable numbers are hard to come by. All I have is what little went public a couple of years ago, benchmark numbers from other launch companies and the public parts NASA contracts. But I should have been more precise: my cash and profitability remark concerned their operative launch business excl. NASA dev contracts and the like. I suspect that their development is financed by external funding while their government contracts are cross-financing their low commercial launch costs. Nothing wrong with that as everybody else in that industry is doing the same thing. Everybody else isn't SpaceX, so.

Just one last thing, I am happy to discuss SpaceX. Because new facts and view points are how we develop. Implying that I call people I don't know liars and that I am full of conspiracy theories is not helping in that regard. Just saying.

What possible reason would you have for personally believing that SpaceX is not cash-flow positive, when the exec teams says that it is, if you are not reading conspiracy theories? Where are these ideas coming from then? We have real legal facts here. Real people in charge of the real company saying real numbers to us, but you're not going to believe them? I'm just not sure how else to talk about this stuff. When the exec team is a proven group of people with a solid track record and a recent history of accomplishing goals, meeting expectations and producing record-breaking technology and revenues - and they tell us facts about being profitable - it's definitely a conspiracy theory to state that they are secretly not profitable.

SpaceX is profitable.

> But considering the state of things in less developed countries, I assume space born Wifi is not the top priority. But hey, if investors are buying into I won't complain.

Reliable and fast access to information improves quality of life, even in places with other problems. Much of the USA is like a developing nation itself, with population-scale problems of getting access to clean water and having basic food security. But still, reliable network access can also improve both of those things too - the internet is backbone infrastructure just like the water pipes, and is needed for a developing country - or a developed one - to grow economically.

> I assume space born Wifi is not the top priority.

Countries, organizations, investors, businesses can all work on more than one thing at once. Something need not be 'top priority' for it to be worthy of investment and continuing to do at break-neck pace.

> my cash and profitability remark concerned their operative launch business excl. NASA dev contracts and the like

Do you mean that you are excluding a primary revenue source from their finances in your calculations? I just don't get it.

Hey, you don't have pitch this thing to me, ok? I. don't have the cash make the smallest imaginable difference in any space-born venture! :-)

I tried to explain my line of thought. You disagree, fine. It is just that when I developed an interest in the financial aspects of the launch business around end of 2018 and early 2019, I wasn't the only one with doubts in that regard. I'm no expert on either aspect, so if there facts out there that proof me wrong just share them. We are all hear to learn, right? Just do me a favour and don't cite reddit, ok?

> It is just that when I developed an interest in the financial aspects of the launch business around end of 2018 and early 2019, I wasn't the only one with doubts in that regard. I'm no expert on either aspect, so if there facts out there that proof me wrong just share them.

Here's what the parent comment was getting at:

> SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said Tuesday that the privately held Hawthorne space company is valued at almost $28 billion based on recent funding rounds, and that it is profitable.[1]

[1] https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-spacex-shotwell-20180...

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