Synopsis

This richly illustrated book is a fictionalized account of the challenges faced by a group of seven investors and their engineering team in developing a low-cost, reusable, Earth-to-orbit launch vehicle. The marketing, regulatory and technical problems are explored, making it an excellent and readable introduction to the technical aspects and challenges facing todayís designers, entrepreneurs, regulators, legislators, and investors.
The business model presented includes numerous timely scenarios and ideas:

• Considering a reusable launch vehicle as a product, which has a different market and better cash flow, than the market for launch services
• Using clever engineering to solve the problem of an economical reusable launch vehicle with existing technology
• Greatly increasing the ìsupplyî of launch capacity, with a reusable vehicle that has low marginal costs per flight, is necessary to drive down the cost of launch to low Earth orbit
• Using modifications of the same basic vehicle to gain access to the inner solar system at reasonable cost.

The increased dedication by both private individuals and government institutions to solving the problem of low-cost, reusable launch vehicles makes this book necessary reading for all those involved in developing solutions. The Rocket Company provides a point of departure for building a consensus on how to take the process through to low cost access to orbit ñ and beyond.

Biography

Patrick J. G. Stiennon is an experienced aerospace engineer and patent attorney at Stiennon & Stiennon, Madison, Wisconsin. He is a Senior Member of AIAA

David M. Hoerr is an aerospace consultant and a lecturer in Engineering Mechanics and Astronautics at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. He is a Senior Member of AIAA.

Doug Birkholz is an award-winning industrial designer and principal at Inspire Design Group LLC, a product design firm based in Middleton, Wisconsin.