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0 pointsdismalpedigree3y ago0 comments

I predict a Chinese version of Starship within 18 months of a successful launch. The Chinese industrial espionage machine is unmatched.

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5 comments · 1 top-level

golol3y ago· 4 in thread

You underestimate how incredibly difficult the work that SpaceX is doing is. No spaceflight oraganization in the world is close to having the capabilities that SpaceX has right now (Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy). Meanwhile Starship is almost ready.

porbelm3y ago

That's why you do industrial espionage though; take advantage of all the R&D done by someone else, so most of the pitfalls are overcome and a lot of the testing is done.

Like knowing what kinds of alloys turned out not to work and why, etc. So you don't have to repeat all that.

georgeg233y ago

Honestly this espionage thing is overrated. Plenty of employees in the US take their knowledge to (domestic) competitors and find it quite hard to just clone a business. The Russians and US were stealing each other's plans during the space race but this often led to misunderstood and suboptimal designs. See Buran

https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Buran_(spacecraft)

fooblaster3y ago

looking at the launch numbers from 2022 you can see that china is fairly close to having the capabilities of the us. Falcon heavy is still several years away from being useful in any capacity.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00048-7#:~:text=1.....

golol3y ago

SpaceX is launching more than twoce the payload to orbit than the rest of the world combined though... without starship. Also how is Falcon Heavy years away from being useful?

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