In a white-floored warehouse in El Segundo, Calif., Varda Space Industries CEO Will Bluey told “Marketplace” host Kai Ryssdal that his company was “a leader in humanity's economic He showed off a meter-wide spacecraft that claims to “expand the limits.”
“We are manufacturing medicine in space,” he said. “By removing gravity, we will be able to manufacture medicines that would not be possible on Earth.”
Varda was founded three years ago by former SpaceX employees and members of Silicon Valley venture capital firm Founders Fund and is part of Southern California's burgeoning commercial space industry. The company's website boldly claims, “Low Earth orbit is now open for business.”
The idea behind it is that certain products, especially pharmaceutical formulations, behave differently when manufactured in microgravity.
“Gravity is like a parameter,” Bluey says. He likened the ability to dial it down by sending chemicals into space to the temperature knob on an oven. “When you put a temperature control knob on your oven, it opens up a world of new recipes and new dishes,” he said. “Similarly, if you can change gravity, you can also change the chemical process of the formulation.”
The emergence of startups like Varda has been made possible by the increase in commercial flights into space on reusable rockets by companies such as SpaceX.
“Transportation to space is now just transportation,” Bluey said. “You can reserve your Rocket slot today by visiting spacex.com/rideshare,” added Eric Lasker, chief revenue officer at Varda. “We're not in a world where, for example, we need to complete a shuttle mission and it's a two-, three-, four-year process,” he said. “You can actually go online today and book a slot on a rideshare mission, just like Varda is doing now.”
The growing number of missions has allowed companies like Varda to experiment with avenues to commercializing space, but regulators are struggling to keep up.
At a Senate subcommittee hearing last month, executives from space companies including SpaceX, Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic urged senators to increase resources for the Federal Aviation Administration's Commercial Space Office.
William Gerstenmeyer, SpaceX's vice president of construction and flight reliability, testified about the slowdown in U.S. commercial space launch and reentry license applications.
He warned senators that unless the process is improved, the U.S. could face “regulatory paralysis that stifles the wealth of innovation and capability that the private sector is bringing to market.”
Varda launched its first capsule into orbit on a SpaceX mission in June, but is still awaiting approval from the Federal Aviation Administration and the U.S. Air Force to bring the spacecraft down to a military test range in Utah.
“I'm not worried long-term because it's basically a red tape at this point,” Bluey said. “But from a physics perspective, [it’s] It's totally fine. ”
While drug experiments on board have been completed for several months, the spacecraft will continue to orbit until the company overcomes the regulatory hurdles necessary to halt the experiments.
“We check on her once a week,” says Wendy Simata, Varda's vice president of autonomous systems. “Otherwise, we’re all on standby…I actually have an app on my phone that lets me know if something goes wrong.”
Derian Asparoukhov, Varda's chairman and president, said that recent changes to the Commercial Space Act of 2023 are intended to make it easier for the FAA and Department of Defense to coordinate on commercial reentry approvals like the one Varda is seeking. praised.
Varda has also reached an agreement with an Australian company to land future missions at a test site in southern Australia, where there will be no need to coordinate with many US agencies.
Bluey said that in five years, he hopes Varda will be able to watch spacecraft launch and re-enter every day. “Transportation to space is now just transportation,” he says. “If you had daily flights into space to bring back drugs, it would feel like it was part of the economy.”
Click on the audio player above to listen to Ryssdal and Brewie's conversation at Varda's El Segundo, California, headquarters.
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